Western Conference Semifinals: Golden State Warriors vs New Orleans Pelicans, Preview, SWOT Analysis & Prediction

Weaknesses

Klay Thompson

Warriors

The Warriors are a turnover-prone team. This was one of their Achilles heels all season long, and they have continued their wastefulness through the first round of the playoffs as well.

Some of this can be attributed purely to their style of play, which requires tough passes be made from time to time and every possession has to have a number of passes to effectively find the most efficient basket. But even conceding for that, they're still giving the ball away for free too often for their own liking.

The Warriors don't have anybody with any chance whatsoever of stopping Anthony Davis on the defensive end. The return of Zaza Pachulia does little to enhance their chances at this uphill task. The likes of McGee, Bell and David West do not have the footspeed or the defensive awareness to do this. Short of putting Kevin Durant on man-to-man duty, they have no strategy for containing Davis readily available.

Pelicans

The Pelicans do not have a body to put on Kevin Durant or even Klay Thompson in this series once Curry makes a comeback. For all of Rajon Rondo's virtues, he does not have the lockdown capability he once did, and that means that even with Holiday packing it into one of the Splash Brothers, the other is left free to face a league-average defender.

The Pelicans' bench unit is not particularly capable of holding its own against the Warriors' deep and varying bench threats. Andre Iguodala, David West, Shaun Livingston, Quinn Cook, Nick Young, Jordan Bell and JaVale McGee will be too much for the likes of Ian Clark, Solomon Hill, Cheick Diallo and Darius Miller.

The Pelicans will have to rely on elite production from its starters for all 4 quarters to just keep pace with the Warriors firing on all cylinders.