The story of Game 3 — as it was in Game 1 — is once again going to be focused on the free-throw discrepancy between the Golden State Warriors and the Los Angeles Lakers: a plus-20 on attempts for the Lakers (37-17) and a plus-16 on makes (28-12).
There’s no denying that the Lakers were rewarded — but credit must be given to them for forcing the issue and putting the officials in situations where they had to call fouls, which also had the side effect of slowing the game down to a crawl and not allowing the Warriors to get into a consistent rhythm, while also having a psychological effect of sowing frustration.