NBA WESTERN CONFERENCE SEMIFINALS: TIMBERWOLVES VS WARRIORS

May 12, 2025

Steve Kerr

Golden State Warriors

Game 4 - Pregame Media Conference

Q. What does Playoff Raymond mean to you?

STEVE KERR: Random stats that don't really help me at all in these interviews.

I texted Raymond this afternoon to congratulate him and his staff and he said something nice back, and then I told him, all right, let's erase these texts and get back to our more comfortable dynamic where we just insult each other all the time. It was a short-lived celebration.

But well-deserved. They do an amazing job.

Q. What are the keys to slowing down Randle, and what makes him such a tough matchup?

STEVE KERR: He's a great player. He's physical. He's strong but he's skilled. Double-figure assists the last two games. So it's not -- it's not a case of stopping him. It's stopping them. All in all, we held them to 102 the other night.

So I think we did a decent job defensively but in the fourth quarter, he and Ant took over. So we've got to figure out a way to slow them down, especially late.

Q. One of the inherent advantages you guys have when you're whole is the closing lineup and options that you have, you can put on the floor. Without Steph and without Draymond in the last game, as it turned out, how does that affect your philosophy on who is out there in a tight game in the final minutes and how much more difficult does it make your job in terms of planning how you're going to close games.

STEVE KERR: Well, it means we're probably going to go with, you know, whatever lineup has the hot hand, like we did the other night with JK playing so well.

But you know, that's par for the course. If you have injuries, you have to adapt and so we'll adapt.

Obviously we'll play through Jimmy and the key tonight is, again, our defense, can we defend at a high level; can we score off our defense, can we get to loose balls, long rebounds, win the possession game. Those are the things we have to do without Steph.

Q. Last game you only had five three-point attempts in the first half. I was wondering how important is it to increase three-point volume, and how do you do that without just forcing up shots that maybe you guys don't want to take?

STEVE KERR: Again, going back to our defense and rebounding. You can get them off offensive boards, crashing, second-chance opportunities, forcing turnovers, getting out in transition and hitting threes that way.

Very difficult to do in the halfcourt without Steph and with -- frankly, with a rotation that doesn't feature a ton of three-point shootings. We have to generate those looks through our defense and rebounding.

Q. You've talked about "playing with pace." Does that mean getting out in the open court or getting your actions quicker in the halfcourt? What does playing with pace mean to you?

STEVE KERR: It means throwing the ball ahead. I thought we had three possessions last night where we didn't slow the ball ahead when someone is open. And that's a really important part of the game. When you throw the ball ahead, it threatens the defense. It flattens the defense out, and then there's plays to be made behind the play.

Q. It felt like you came up with a blueprint in Game 3, at least some tactics to stay in the game. Guys got tired down the stretch, but what did you learn from Game 3 that you can carry over in Game 4?

STEVE KERR: I mean, it's always a series-long process of learning, and so I don't look at it so much as Game 3, as I do all three of the first games.

And so we've seen some things defensively that we like. We've seen what they are doing defensively. And you take every bit of film and you dissect it and you try to figure out you know what can we do to improve our chances of winning.

So the things that we've talked, the pace, the offensive rebounding, forcing turnovers, those are things that we have all gleaned from the first three games.

Q. Following up on that, when you talk about ways of winning, have you had any side-bar conversations with any of the guys, maybe Podziemski or Moses, Moody, Buddy, we need to you do this one thing because this will make you more of a contributor in this game because we need it because Steph is not out there?

STEVE KERR: That's my job. So yes, I have conversations with our players all the time, and we collaborate as a group. We watch tape with the whole team, and our older guys will chip in with thoughts for our younger guys.

So that's really the process that we go through for sure.

Q. I guess specifically, I'm asking, if you have those conversations and with who?

STEVE KERR: Yes, and I am going to specifically say I'm not going to answer that.

Q. What do you appreciate about Jimmy's leadership style? As a calming force, what do you appreciate about the way he leads?

STEVE KERR: Just his calm under pressure. His comfort level in being the guy and taking on the responsibility. It's general genuine behind the scenes. It's authentic while it's happening. He's a true clutch performer, just unafraid of the moment and willing to take on the responsibility that comes with that. So he's been amazing.

Q. Since getting Jimmy, especially, you guys have been really good at generating points off turnovers. In the last game, it didn't happen as much and I know they weren't all live ball turnovers but you had seven turnovers and no points off them in the fourth quarter. Why do you think that is? Is it what you were saying before about not passing ahead or what was it?

STEVE KERR: Yeah, I think we can be more efficient, for sure, in creating advantages by throwing the ball ahead. There were several dead-ball turnovers where they threw the ball out-of-bounds. So we are still setting up against their set defense.

Yeah, we have to continue to push the pace, push the tempo, especially when we have advantages, whether it's a turnover or a guy is down, comes into the paint and shoots and falls down and it's a five-on-four. We have to take advantage of that in this series for sure.

Q. To state the obvious, a 2-2 series is different than a 3-1 series, and I know you're not one to make speeches for the guys. They have the plan and it's on them to execute but still, coming to the arena today, what's your emotional read on where the team is at?

STEVE KERR: Team is in a great state. We understand the circumstances, and we feel good about the matchup. We feel good about our ability to guard Minnesota, and we felt like we had some game plan mistakes last game. I thought our guys played really, really hard.

But I thought we had some game plan discipline issues, and if we clean those things up, then we feel great about our chances to win tonight, and we're looking at this as a great opportunity.

Q. What are the keys on the defensive glass tonight?

STEVE KERR: The keys?

Q. Yeah. On the defensive glass.

STEVE KERR: We lost our shell the other night. You talk about a defensive shell where you've got five guys who are kind of connected. There were a lot of shots that they took where we leaked out, and the shell doesn't end until the possession ends, until we get the rebound. And we had way too many possessions the other night where we leaked out, and kind of lost our foothold at the elbows where a lot of those long rebounds go. So we've got to clean that up for sure.

Q. Down the stretch the other night Draymond had fouled out and you didn't have him out there. What did you miss about him not being out there in those last few minutes of the game? What might have changed for you?

STEVE KERR: Well, he's been there a million times and he's the best defender in the league, and you're trying to get stops in the last four minutes of the game and Draymond Green is not out there. You miss all of that. Hopefully he's there the last four tonight.

Q. He's had some high-impact games in this postseason and low-impact games. What do you need from him this game tonight?

STEVE KERR: I thought he was in a little bit of a rush the other night. He had the five turnovers. I thought we were a little careless with the ball in the first half. We have to set a better tone and Draymond can help us do that. He's our leader. Keys going to handle the ball quite a bit with Steph out, and I've seen Draymond bounce back from tough games, a million times, I have to doubt he's going to do that.

He's just got to be the guy who has won a lot of championships and won a lot of playoff games, and I'm sure he's going to be that guy tonight.