It's rare that the best team in the NBA doesn't win the championship or even reach the Finals, but Harrison Barnes believes that's exactly what happened in 2016.
Appearing on the "Road Trippin'" podcast, Barnes took a trip down memory lane discussing his time with the Warriors, who ended up losing to the Cavs after holding a 3-1 series lead in the 2016 NBA Finals.
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In Barnes' opinion, the Warriors were lucky to beat the Thunder in the Western Conference finals. Golden State is often on the wrong end of 3-1 jokes, but Oklahoma City likely would have received far more criticism for its own 3-1 collapse if not for the Cavs' memorable comeback.
A historic performance by Klay Thompson in Game 6 of that Thunder-Warriors series prevented OKC from battling Cleveland for the Larry O'Brien Trophy.
"I don’t mean this in any type of offense to RJ [Richard Jefferson] or anything like that," Barnes said. "But my opinion is that OKC was probably the best team in the playoffs that year.
"I mean they were rollin'. We didn’t have an answer for them. If Klay doesn’t have that crazy Game 6, they’re going to the Finals."
Barnes echoed the thoughts of Warriors forward Andre Iguodala, who previously said the Thunder "should've won a championship."
"They were the best team last year in the league in the playoffs," Iguodala said of OKC in 2016. "They were better than us. They were better than Cleveland. They were the best team in the playoffs."
The Thunder finished third in the Western Conference that year and rolled through the Mavericks and Spurs in five and six games, respectively. They looked untouchable in the series against the defending champion Warriors, but cold shooting in Game 5 and Game 6 opened the door for a dramatic comeback.
Golden State eventually won the series in seven games, but the Warriors lost to the Cavs in the championship round after an incredible series by LeBron James and clutch play by Kyrie Irving. That loss altered the balance of power in the NBA, as it opened the door for Kevin Durant to pack his bags and fly west. The rest is history.
If Thompson doesn't go for 41 points in Game 6 against the Thunder, Barnes is convinced we might have seen different champions.
"That team, the way they were built — rebounding, scoring, they were doing it all."
