The Warriors will be getting one of their top players back to start the postseason, according to Shams Charania and Anthony Slater of The Athletic (Twitter link), who report that Andrew Wiggins has been cleared for Game 1 against the Kings on Saturday.
Charania says the Warriors are “leaning toward” having the 28-year-old come off the bench initially, and he’s expected to play in the range of 20-25 minutes. As Slater notes (via Twitter), Golden State took a similar approach with Stephen Curry when the playoffs started last season after he had missed the last month of the 2021/22 regular season due to injury.
Both Curry and head coach Steve Kerr have said that Wiggins “looked good” in 5-on-5 scrimmages over the past week. Kerr told reporters on Thursday that he wasn’t sure if Wiggins would be on a minutes restriction.
“On one hand, Wiggs is one of those guys who doesn’t seem to fall out of shape … on the other hand he hasn’t played in 10 weeks,” Kerr said (Twitter link via ESPN’s Kendra Andrews).
The veteran forward last played on February 13, missing the final 25 games of the regular season due to a personal matter. Wiggins wound up playing a career-low 37 games (32.2 MPG) in ’22/23, averaging 17.1 PPG, 5.0 RPG, 2.3 APG and 1.2 SPG on .473/.396/.611 shooting.
A former No. 1 overall pick, Wiggins was pivotal during last year’s championship run and figures to be a major player in the Warriors’ chances to defend their title.
Strange
Wiggins looks 5 years younger than 2 months ago
LOL it’s his new haircut
Sillivan bringin truth for once haha
I think he’ll be fine. I predict we see very little rust on Wiggon
Friendly reminder that the Looney-Dray-Wiggins-Klay-Steph lineup was far and away the best lineup based off +/- when they played, admittedly its a smaller sample, but we also know these guys, it’s fair to assume it still is the best single lineup in the NBA this year.
GP2 also looks so good…GSW are losing 3 games max from here on out…
Oh, so you think the favored team will win? How brave!
This is the same guy who said the Warriors wouldn’t lose 10 games all season.
They’re not favored to win “from here on out.”
Lmao not a death lineup guy. Go look at how many games the Warriors won when at full strength. I think you’d be surprised
Good news for Warriors. I think the best news. Is getting Kings in 1st rd. This is only series they could win. To me Sabonis is the key. He plays big then Kings can win.
To many sport writers are writing off the Kings. I see it as a chess match of 2 different coaches. Its going 6 or 7 games. Kings can match GSW offensively. GSW need to play good Defense and not turn over the ball to win.
Kings coach knows Warriors too. So it should be competitive. Good to see Wiggins back.
Welcome back Andrew – and just in time – go Warriors!
Go kings!