The Golden State Warriors have put the rest of the NBA on notice that their ‘scary’ team are not done winning championships, as they arrived back in San Francisco in possession of the Larry O’Brien trophy.
Led by Stephen Curry, the Warriors took hold of a series-winning Game 6 in Boston Thursday night to seal a fourth NBA Finals win in eight years.
Curry, clad in a yellow hoodie and a ‘championship’ snapback, carried the NBA Finals MVP trophy off the team jet as the Warriors squad got a hero’s welcome back at San Francisco’s International Airport.
With a cigar resting in between his lips, the Davidson college graduate put his arms out wide as fans gathered to greet coach Steve Kerr and his players to celebrate their latest championship win.
‘It’s nice to bring old Larry back where he belongs,’ Curry told reporters.
‘Like Draymond (Green) said it’s the Warriors reputation and so we back!
‘This is pretty special for sure. To get the job done, it’s an emotional rollercoaster.
‘A lot of work goes into it, the whole team is excited but everyone is exhausted so we need to rest before the parade on Monday.’
It was defensive stopper Green that carried the Larry O’Brien championship trophy off the plane.
Asked if a fifth championship in nine years is possible, with Warriors favoured with oddsmakers to repeat next year, Green struggled to see why they cannot pull it off.
‘It still has not been proven, that when we’re whole, that anybody can stop it,’ Green said.
Golden State won back to back titles in 2017 and 2018 with an MVP-level Kevin Durant in tow.
Durant, along with Klay Thompson suffered season-ending injuries in the 2019 Finals against Toronto Raptors and this squad have not been fully healthy up until this season, which has seen key young players such as Jordan Poole, Gary Payton II and Otto Porter Jnr emerge.
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Coach Steve Kerr hailed a ‘beautiful’ night celebrating their fourth title in the last eight years
‘And we ain’t done,’ Thompson said early Friday while appearing on Green’s podcast, The Draymond Green Show.
‘That’s the beautiful thing about it. We got these young bucks behind us and we got the same squad coming back? That’s scary for the NBA.’
Green concurred. ‘It is very scary,’ he said.
Warriors coach Kerr, who is now a nine-time champion with five as a player and four as a coach, almost had his voice vanish as he spoke upon a return to San Francisco.
‘We had a great night last night, we had an incredible night, a late night, just celebrating with the team and their families. Just a beautiful night,’ he said.
‘This one was the most unlikely championship of the four that we have had.’