Warriors keep up their scoring even on a rest day
The final score of Wednesday’s season opener was corrected by the NBA, meaning Golden State actually won by 36 points, 140-104. De’Anthony Melton is now alone in 6th place of the team’s 2024-25 scoring list.
How good is the Golden State Warriors’ offense this season? They scored a point on Thursday without taking the court.
— NBA Official (@NBAOfficial) October 25, 2024
Thursday, the NBA announced that there had been a scoring error in Wednesday’s opening night win over the Portland Trail Blazers. When De’Anthony Melton went to the foul line with two minutes left in the third quarter and split two free throws, he was incorrectly credited with two misses. Now, the NBA changed the final score from 139-104 to 140-104, and Melton has been credited with 11 points instead of 10.
While this seems like a very basic, avoidable error in counting, the circumstances around the trip to the line were unusual. After Melton missed his second free throw, Kyle Anderson rebounded the miss, then put back the subsequent miss by Brandin Podziemski for a three-point play the hard way.
It’s not clear if Melton or anyone on the Warriors noticed the scoring error, as it came during a 21-4 22-4 run (the NBA issued an official correction of this post), and it’s easy for a single point to get lost during such an avalanche of scoring. Melton certainly acted like he was fired up by the perceived official disrespect, stealing a pass and taking it in for a dunk on the next possession. Two possessions later, Anderson stole the ball from Scoot Henderson and Melton dunked again.
That gave Melton 11 points on the game, on 4-for-11 shooting, with three steals and four assists. Perhaps this will light a fire under Jonathan Kuminga, previously tied with Melton with 10 points. We’re going out on a limb and saying that Kuminga probably overtakes Melton’s total soon, with or without a stat correction.
But the best correction about Melton comes in his status for Friday’s game against the Utah Jazz. He was on the injury report with a chest contusion, but like fellow injury report teammates Steph Curry and Draymond Green, he’s expected to play. And this time his free throws are all going to count!