OAKLAND -- If Quinn Cook plays at anything close to the level he performed Friday night against the Kings, the Warriors should avoid any catastrophic stumbling in the absence of their top three scorers.
They stumbled plenty in a 98-93 loss to Sacramento, but not because of Cook. The two-way player who has spent most of the season with G-League Santa Cruz scored a team-high 25 points, shot 10-of-13 from the field and played respectable defense.
He did more than could have been reasonably expected.
"I felt like this was coming," coach Steve Kerr said. "He was fantastic. He really lit it up and gave us a huge boost."
The Warriors ran into problems elsewhere, shared among the usually reliable veterans who need to be particularly reliable in the absence of Stephen Curry, Kevin Durant and Klay Thompson.
Usual starters Draymond Green and Zaza Pachulia combined to shoot 6-of-20.
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Usual reserves Andre Iguodala, Shaun Livingston, David West and Nick Young shot a collective 13-of-39.
In the second half, when Warriors mustered only 34 points -- a season-low for any half -- the six vets combined to take 32 shots and missed 24.
Those are atrocious numbers and they explain what went wrong in a game that was there for the taking.
They're also an anomaly.
"We just couldn't get anything going," Green said. "But we got some good shots. We got ‘Dre on a couple of pull-ups in the lane, I got a couple open shots, Nick got a couple open shots, Zaza got a couple open ones. D-West had one pop in and out. (Kevon Looney) had two pop in and out.
"We just got cold. But hopefully those shots will fall tomorrow."
West, returning after missing four games with a cyst on his right arm, was 1-of-6 from the field. He came into this game as a 60.8-percent shooter this season.
Igoudala was 4-of-10; he shot 70 percent over the previous 10 games. Young was 5-of-15, well below his 44-percent shooting this season. Livingston's 3-of-8 shooting is uncharacteristic of someone shooting at least 50 percent for four years running.
If history is any indication, Green (5-of-14) and Pachulia (1-of-6) are not going continue to miss at the rate they did in this game, the first this season in which the Warriors were without all three of their top scorers.
If history is any indication, the Warriors can't be counted on to score 34 points on 27.3-percent shooting in the second half of a game.
"I loved how our guys battled," Kerr said. "They really competed well and made some big plays. We just couldn't get the ball to go down quite enough in the second half."
That's going to change, perhaps as soon as Saturday night in Phoenix, were the Suns are playing to lose.
So if Cook plays steady basketball, the Warriors will fall off and their fans won't become a basket case while waiting for the three shooters. The Warriors surely believe that.
"He really showed up. I've been waiting on that Quinn," Green said. "We needed that. It was great for him to come out and play like that. And most importantly, his shots were falling. Since he's been playing (more often) he's been playing well, but his shots weren't really falling. But tonight, they fell for him."
They won't always fall at a rate of 77 percent. They won't have to once his teammates drop in a few more of their own shots.
