Butler: Warriors need to 'focus on us' in Game 7 vs. Rockets

Golden State Warriors forward Jimmy Butler urged his team to be more introspective after the Houston Rockets won Game 6 on Friday to force a winner-take-all showdown Sunday in Texas.

"We'll be ready. I think we got to stop focusing so much on them and focus on us," Butler told reporters after the Warriors lost 115-107, dropping their final home game of the series. "If we do that, then we're going to be fine.

"We're not going to sit here and act like we've been playing our best version of basketball, because we haven't. And they've been doing OK, but they haven't played their best version of basketball either."

Friday's loss marked back-to-back missed opportunities for Golden State to close out the first-round matchup after taking a 3-1 series lead. Despite 29 points from Stephen Curry and another 27 from Butler, reserve guards Moses Moody (13) and Brandin Podziemski (10) were the only other Warriors to score double-digits as all five starters finished with a negative plus-minus.

Steve Kerr's squad entered the fourth trailing by only two points but a foul by Gary Payton Jr. on a made 3-pointer by Fred VanVleet six seconds into the frame appeared to crush the Warriors' momentum. Golden State scored just five points through the final frame's first eight minutes, during which Houston's lead ballooned to 17 - its largest of the game.

Veteran forward Draymond Green said the Warriors' effort level is what has allowed the Rockets to prolong the series.

"Get loose balls," Green told reporters, including 95.7 The Game, when asked what his team needs to do to win Game 7. "I think they probably had 20 points off broken plays and getting loose balls and kicking out for threes, so get loose balls. And we'll defend them way better.

"(We're) kind of getting a first effort, but in order to beat this team you gotta make second and third efforts. And the last two games we have not done that."