OAKLAND -- The defending champion Warriors started cracking in the hours before tipoff Tuesday night and broke apart when they usually come together.
The fourth quarter was a disaster area and it cost the Warriors, as the Houston Rockets wiped out a 13-point deficit and tagged them with a 122-121 loss before a stunned sellout crowd at Oracle Arena.
So ends, as it should, the spurious notion of a rubber-stamp championship for the Warriors. A strain here and a tweak there and they found themselves on the painful end of the score.
The Warriors learned prior to the game that forward Andre Iguodala, their valuable Sixth Man, would be out nursing a strained back. They were hit with another injury, this one to Draymond Green, who was highly effective, late in the third quarter.
"He was our best player tonight," coach Steve Kerr said. "He was the guy who was bringing the energy and the life."
Green's numbers -- 9 points, 11 rebounds and 13 assists -- barely hint at his value in this game. Green and Iguodala are the primary defensive communicators, and Green held it down fairly well -- until he, too, was gone.
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"Our communication wasn't very good and we didn't stick to the game plan; we gave them too many wide-open threes," said Klay Thompson, who scored 11 first-quarter points but only 5 over the final three.
"We did a good job in the half-court of keeping them in front," said Kevin Durant, who also scolded himself for committing eight turnovers. "But in transition we got cross-matched so many times and we just didn't communicate well enough."
Games aren't always lost in the fourth, despite the frequent narrative, but this one most assuredly was. With Green in the locker room accompanied by ice, the Warriors were outscored 34-20 in the fourth quarter.
After shooting 45.8 percent through three quarters, the Rockets took it to 56 percent in the fourth, closing the game on a 13-5 run over the final 4:01.
The Warriors don't yet know when Green and Iguodala will return, whether it's as soon as Friday at New Orleans or a matter of weeks. Until they do, Kerr will have to resort to patching things together.
Problem is, aside from the scoring of Nick Young (23 points on 8-of-9 shooting, including 6-of-7 from deep) and Jordan Bell (8 points on 4-of-5 shooting in 12 minutes), the bench did not distinguish itself.
That was particularly true on defense, which happen to be where Iguodala and Green make their greatest impact. The reserves accounted for 13 of the 25 fouls called on the Warriors.
"We've got to be better," Durant said. "We've got to be better, and we're looking forward to practice Wednesday."
