Andrew Wiggins and Jonathan Kuminga find on-court harmony. But is it too little, too late?
CHICAGO — Jonathan Kuminga had his left foot soaking in an ice bucket as his teammates scrambled around the visiting locker room, hurriedly packing up for the midnight bus ride from Chicago to Milwaukee.
It served as a reminder that Kuminga has been playing on a sore toe for weeks. But, for once, the Warriors locker room wasn’t consumed by aches, pains, doom or gloom. It brimmed with pride. What’s looked good about this team on paper came to life — in this case, that meant Jonathan Kuminga and Andrew Wiggins sharing the floor together without utter disaster.
Not only did Kuminga and Wiggins get some minutes together, the two closed Friday’s win alongside Steph Curry, Klay Thompson and Dario Saric.
It came as a shock considering Steve Kerr publicly soured on the idea of playing the pair together after the experiment to start them against the Toronto Raptors went awry. A week earlier, leaks spilled that Kuminga was frustrated with his playing time and pitched Kerr that the positives of having the pair play together might outweigh the growing pain bumps. He didn’t want to compete with Wiggins anymore, but he also saw the upside.
“As a player, I don’t want to hear everybody saying ‘Oh, JK and Wiggs can’t play together,'” Kuminga said. “So I just wanted to play with the guy more.”
The margin for error is too thin to experiment with disaster, and up until Friday the pair’s minutes were disastrous — a minus-84 in 25 total minutes. But the Warriors came to Chicago in a spiritual slump with every type of experimentation on the table to snap out of it. Kuminga and Wiggins were playing well individually, getting under Chicago’s 3-point shooters, getting active at the rim and scoring. They had to join forces.
“Putting them with Dario helped spread the floor and I thought both JK and Wiggs were playing such great games that you have to throw them out there,” Kerr said. “Two of our best players tonight. JK, I thought this was maybe his best game played not just because he made four 3s, but his spirit and energy, he seemed right. He seemed comfortable. The whole team was committed to winning. Very proud of them.”
It was no disaster. They were a plus-1 in seven total minutes together. In the first play, Wiggins swung one of his eight assists to Thompson for a tight-window 3 to increase the lead from four to seven. Then with two minutes left, Wiggins jousted under the rim with Nikola Vucevic and Zach LaVine for a Thompson miss and deflected the ball back out to Thompson, who swung the ball to Kuminga behind the arc. Kuminga flipped the ball to Curry and set a screen on DeMar DeRozan to get Curry an open two.
“I love sharing the court with Wiggs because we both play defense,” Kuminga said. “We both go out there and guard the best players. It’s more about getting to know each other — not off the court, we know each other better than anybody — but on the court we haven’t gotten a chance to play together.
“Even in practice we aren’t on the same team. So it’s tough for us to go out there and figure it out. Once we mess up one or two times, the coaches won’t let that happen. They will try to figure out something that will help us win.”
In scrimmages, Kuminga and Wiggins are often on opposing teams guarding each other instead of alongside each other, Kuminga added later. It takes reps to develop in-game compatibility.
“We have to learn from each other, we have to learn what each other likes and how to play together,” Kuminga said.
But the Warriors may not be in a place to celebrate one three-minute glimmer. Truth is, this team needed the theoretical advantages — such as this Kuminga, Wiggins pairing — to work in practice from Day 1.
Wiggins and Kuminga’s names have and will pop up in trade rumors; other teams will come calling, thinking they can squeeze more juice from either than the Warriors have been able to this year. A win can galvanize, but the reality is they’re still the 12th seed at 18-20 with the trade deadline less than a month away.
The championship window is slim and any sniff of roster incompatibility needs to be addressed ASAP. A good three-minute stint may be too little, too late.