With the Warriors nursing a two-point lead and less than 3 minutes to go Wednesday against the Denver Nuggets, Golden State coach Don Nelson called for “one flop, point-five.”
The objective was to have a little give-and-go between Andris Biedrins and Stephen Jackson. Biedrins would feed Jackson the ball at the elbow on one side of the lane, saunter up to his position, then take a handoff back from Jackson while breaking into a sprint past his defender and to the rim.
It all sounded good in theory. More and more this season, Biedrins has been showing the perimeter abilities that executive vice president Chris Mullin has long maintained were in the fourth-year center’s arsenal, dating back to his days as a teenager in Latvia who despite his nearly 7-foot frame played on the wing, not in the paint.
There was, however, one problem. When Biedrins, a lefty, took possession of the ball at the midcourt line, Jackson was lined up on the right-hand side of the line, with the other three Warriors clogging up the left side of the court.
“Before that play, I told Jack, ‘Go on the left side,’” Biedrins recalled Thursday. “And then I’m running down and I see he’s standing (on the right) and I’m like, ‘C’mon, Jack.’ I was like, ‘OK, let’s run it anyway.’ There was no time to move everything around.”
There was no need, either. Biedrins took one dribble with his unfamiliar right hand, two giant steps and then rammed the ball home for a one-handed righty slam over the attempted block by Denver’s Nene.
“I’ve never seen him really take it all the way with his right (hand) like that,” Nelson said. “That was quite a play.”
