In December 2005, The Utah Statesman wrote an article about the student team manager for USU's women's basketball team. His name was Atlee Zipf from Stockton, CA. He was my oldest brother's best friend and had a heavy influence on my life. In my early teen years, Zipf convinced me USU was the greatest college in the world and the only NBA team worth rooting for was the Golden State Warriors.
In 2005, I was living in California and the Warriors just wrapped up their 11th consecutive season of missing the playoffs. It's 2016 now. I write articles for Utah State's newspaper and my Warriors just wrapped up the regular season with the best record in NBA history.
I now believe in miracles.
I've been questioning my loyalty as a fan since the Dubs hit the media spotlight. I realized I was a true follower when my roommate asked me, "It's not like the Warriors were really ever that bad, right?" Anybody who truly knows the Dubs knows that we've always been bad.
In March of 2012, our fans booed our very owner Joe Lacob off the mic during a pre-game speech about team history. I guess we had a good two seasons with Baron Davis. We had a lucky first-round playoff upset in 2007 against the 1-seed Mavericks. He led us over .500 the next year but we lost the playoff race. Aside from that, I recall looking up team stats wondering who the heck Monta Ellis was and why we ever traded Gilbert Arenas back in '03. From 1997 to 2013, none of our players made an All-Star game. People would react to my Warriors hoodie asking if that was my high school logo. Oh, how the tables have turned.
Yes, my Warriors love deems me worthy of the definitive hipster phrase: "I liked them before it was cool." But I never saw it coming. I felt the magic watching us in the 2013 playoffs. We entered a 6-seed, made it to the second round, and were the only Western Conference team to win a game (we won two!) against the Spurs. Our season record improved the next year and I saw pure gold developing. Yet for any reason, we fired coach Mark Jackson. I loved that guy. He changed our team around! But perhaps our executives saw a bigger potential; something beyond the arc.
So in 2014, we gambled on a man with zero coaching experience, hiring the sharp-shooting PG from the 90's Bulls lineup Steve Kerr as head coach. Somehow, the Dubs launched from being the Clippers' allegorical little brother to being the greatest in the league. And now: The Greatest of All-Time.
My Warriors have come a long way in the last five years. We've won a Championship with 3-point monster Stephen Curry, who's currently writing the final sentence of his second MVP acceptance speech. We have trustworthy shooter Klay Thompson and the stat sheet filler Draymond Green at his side. We finished the season 73-9, a record not even achieved by Michael Jordan's Bulls. Michael Jordan. If the forever-bad Golden State Warriors can do this, I can make it through college.
For all I know, we can still blow it in the playoffs. But it's hard not to soak in this moment. I've watched the Dubs lose many games before I watched us get 73 wins. I accept bandwagon fans wholeheartedly. It's just as funny watching Dubs fans pop out of the ground as it is watching my favorite team make a professional sport look like NBA 2K on Rookie mode.
Atlee Zipf, we've waited a long time for this.
