Shaun Livingston cannot be a Splash Brother.
He doesn’t splash. He ripples, with a comparatively quiet role as a reserve in the back court of Stephen Curry and Klay Thompson, hitting mid-range shots and forcing defenses into mismatches as a 6-foot-7 point guard posting up while the two starters snap the nets with storms of 3-pointers, living on as a 30-year-old basketball survivor in contrast to the young Warriors All-Stars still rising.
But then comes nights like Thursday, in Game 1 of The Finals, when it’s a Livingston world for important stretches, and water is flying everywhere, no matter how the DNA tests come back.
It is not just the precision work against the Cavaliers inside Oracle Arena — eight baskets in 10 attempts, not one with the dramatic effect of being launched from behind the arc, plus three assists without a turnover — either. Livingston’s dunk in Game 7 of the Western Conference finals against the Thunder, spotting the defense parting in front of him late in the third quarter to bolt down the lane and attack the rim for the score that became an emotional spark to eventual victory, could turn out to be one of the critical Golden State plays of the entire season. Then, three nights later, in the same raucous building, he followed with a steady overall performance that helped deliver the 104-89 victory over the Cavaliers as Curry went 4-for-15 from the field and Thompson was 4-for-12.
LeBron James said afterward, “Obviously the game ball goes to Shaun Livingston. Came in, gave them a huge spark.” That he did. It’s more than that, though.
Livingston has been at the forefront two games in a row, the two that formed the most urgent intersection of 2015-16, the end of the previous series as the Warriors became only the 10th team to ever rally from a 3-1 playoff deficit and straight into the rematch with Cleveland in The Finals.
The impact in the moment is everything. Golden State wins one round on Monday and three days later, with all of one practice and one shootaround to prepare for the new opponent, jumps out to an early lead in the best-of-seven series that continues Sunday at Oracle.
The big-picture impact? An entire career narrative is changing right before our eyes.
The comeback storyline will never completely fade away, how Livingston was the No. 4 pick in the 2004 draft with a limitless future as a big point guard in the Penny Hardaway mold before he mangled his left knee as a Clipper on Feb. 26, 2007, an injury so severe that Livingston overheard amputation being mentioned as a possibility that night. He came back from that and built a career that has been long but unspectacular, bouncing around the league with everyone impressed he could at least play on but also continuously talking about what could have been.
Now, though, he has calmly but defiantly, with his understated personality and the definition of veteran leadership as one of the most popular Warriors among teammates, bent the conversation with a 72 hours or so that could have a major role in a second consecutive title. It’s not just about the last two games, because he made a key contribution to the 2015 championship and has been prominent the entire season of the repeat bid, yet Monday and Thursday were that big. Golden State could have lost and been eliminated or could have lost and been down 1-0 if the Cavaliers were able to take advantage of Curry and Thompson going silent at the same time, and then neither happened.
The updated Livingston narrative: What he is actually doing, not what could have been. What is.
Among all the special moments as a Warrior, none compare to this week.
“You look at The Finals, I’d say yes,” he said, agreeing with the assessment. “But, again, it’s just really trying to stay in the moment. We had such a group effort tonight off the bench. (Leandro) Barbosa again. Barbosa, Andre (Iguodala). Some nights it’s been (Marreese Speights). It could be anybody on any given night off the bench and it’s our job, really, to stay ready.”
Which they did.
“I think, first of all, he just played a great game, but I thought he looked for openings,” coach Steve Kerr said of Livingston. “He was very aggressive. And this was a strange game for us. We’re not used to having both Steph and Klay off like that with their shooting. But the one thing we’ve talked about all year is if we defend and take care of the ball, then we’re always going to have somebody score enough points for us, whether it’s the starters or the bench. I thought we played great defense. We had nine turnovers total and that allowed us to control the game. And our bench obviously gave us a huge lift.”
Livingston most of all, of course, with the 20 points in 27 minutes for a season-high in scoring while The Brothers struggled on offense. He helped save the Warriors again. He helped re-direct the storyline of an entire career, from what happened on a night in Los Angeles in 2007 to what he has done in two seasons in Oakland, never more obvious than this week.
That is not a bad splash, after all.
Scott Howard-Cooper has covered the NBA since 1988. You can e-mail him here and follow him on Twitter.
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