While the Warriors were returning to Oakland after reopening the Finals by landing Toronto on one of the most unpredictable evenings in recent history Nba, the unlucky hero Kevin Durant flew in the opposite direction. The unlucky hero of race-5 has landed in New York, to begin to understand how to be reborn after the injury to the Achilles tendon that closed his Finals even 12 'after they had begun. The first step is an MRI, of which the Warriors already knew the results: it is a question of obtaining the official confirmation of the gravity of the accident, of understanding how and when to set up the surgery, of how to organize a long-term rehabilitation and that could cost him the whole 2019-20.

TURNING THE PAGE

Durant must start thinking about its future, which also includes free agency, with the choice between exercising the 31.5 million Player Option for 2019-20 or leaving the contract to look for a better one, why not from the Warriors themselves who can offer him more years (5 against 4) and more money (221 million dollars against 164) than all the other suitors, who will be there anyway. But Golden State must first of all think about the present, because the Finals are not finished. Of course, without Durant they are much more complicated, because in those 12 'before stopping KD had shown that with him the Warriors resemble that unbeatable team that everyone thought they were. "It will be hard even to recover after all that has happened - Steph Curry told after race-5, in the belly of the Scotiabank Arena -. I don't know what it will take to do it, maybe the right word spoken in the locker room or something else. I only know that we understand the moment in which we are and that we can overturn everything ".

THE NEW WARRIORS

Golden State has played 226 'out of 240 in these Finals without having Durant available. But there will be a before and an after injury. Because Toronto is 3-2 ahead, because race 6 will be the last game of history at the Oracle Arena and the Warriors would like to avoid greeting their home for the last 47 years seeing their opponents party. The final of race-5 said that it always depends on Steph Curry and Klay Thompson, 12 triples in two. If Steph is a constant at 32.4 average points, race 5 said that Klay is fully recovered after the adductor problem that forced him to skip the third act: he travels at 25 points on average, he pounds from the bow with an incredible 57.1%. He will have to make the difference on the perimeter, as well as in defense. As well as Draymond Green, emotional leader of the Warriors and third best scorer at 12. 8 points per race (to which it adds 9.2 rebounds and 8.6 assists). Golden State is looking for another scorer: the natural candidate is DeMarcus Cousins, decisive in attack in race-5 but disastrous in defense in the final, when the precarious condition after 45 days of absence has not held up. He will return to the post, after the exclusion to leave room for Durant, but it would be important for Steve Kerr to have Kevon Looney, who will have to bear the pain of the intercostal cartilage fracture: he ensures in the center role that defense that Cousins ​​fails to give. Certainly, the Warriors in race 5 proved to be still alive. It could only be the consequence for the pride after KD's injury, the reaction of a team of phenomena with their backs to the wall. Once the Durant shock has been eliminated, however, race 5 must be a starting point.