Quinn Cook vows Warriors-Raptors ‘not even close' with Kevin Durant

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Eleven months later, the result still bedevils Quinn Cook.

The Warriors had made their fifth consecutive NBA Finals, the second in a row with Cook as a member of the team. As they limped into Toronto to open the series, they were without Kevin Durant, the two-time reigning Finals MVP.

Durant returned for Game 5 but was sidelined for good in the second quarter. The Warriors rallied to win, returning to Oakland down 3-2 in the series. They led by five (85-80) late in the third quarter of Game 6 when five-time All-Star Klay Thompson limped off with a torn ACL.

Entering to replace Thompson, Cook knew what that meant. Without KD and Klay the series would tilt toward the Raptors. They won Game 6, sending the Warriors into the offseason.

“But I still believe ... if K doesn’t get hurt ... it’s not even close,” Cook told NBC Sports Bay Area in a Zoom conference Wednesday.

“We win in five.”

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Durant played a total of 12 minutes in The Finals, scoring 11 points, before leaving Game 5 with a torn Achilles’ tendon. Thompson was having a marvelous series, averaging 26.0 points and shooting 24-of-41 (58.6 percent) from distance.

“We were a quarter away,” recalled Cook, who is promoting the documentary “Basketball County: In the Water,” premiering on Showtime Friday night at 8 p.m. “If Klay doesn’t get hurt, I like our chances in Game 7.”

When Toronto came back to win Game 6 and celebrate on the court at Oracle Arena, all the Warriors could do was accept defeat and watch.

“They went through a tough gauntlet in the East,” Cook said of the Raptors. “They beat some great teams. Orlando. They beat Philly in Game 7. They beat a tough Milwaukee team.

“We were banged up. But we fought. And they outlasted us.”

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The Warriors opened the fourth quarter of Game 6 with Shaun Livingston and Cook in the backcourt, Draymond Green and Jonas Jerebko at forward and DeMarcus Cousins, also at less than 100 percent, at center. They battled. And when Steph Curry returned with 9:41 left, he was bracketed by two and sometimes three defenders.

If only Durant and Thompson, perhaps either of them played, it might have been different.

“It’s something that’s going to haunt me forever, man,” said Cook, who as a free agent signed with the Los Angeles Lakers last summer. “I think we should have won last year. But that’s what happens. You’ve got to stay healthy. You’ve got to have a little bit of luck.

"Toronto got it done.”

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