Jordan Poole On 1st Game vs. Warriors After Wizards Trade: 'It Was Just Special'

Even though the Washington Wizards came up short in Friday night's loss to the Golden State Warriors, Jordan Poole had nothing but positive things to say about his first game at Chase Center as a visiting player.

"It was just special," Poole, who scored a team-high 25 points, told reporters after the game.

Poole's tenure with the Warriors was marred by the incident with Draymond Green during training camp in October 2022 when Green punched him.

Per The Ringer's Logan Murdock, Poole spent last season feeling "isolated" from the rest of his Warriors teammates because Green refused to take steps to repair the relationship between the two.

Following Golden State's victory over the Boston Celtics in the 2022 NBA Finals, it was assumed that Poole was part of the long-term plan for the franchise. He had a breakout 2021-22 season with 18.5 points per game on 36.4 percent three-point shooting.

Despite some erratic moments in that postseason, Poole had good games that were crucial to getting the Warriors back to the Finals. He scored 23 points on 7-of-10 shooting off the bench in a 126-117 win over the Dallas Mavericks in Game 2 of the Western Conference Finals.

Poole signed a four-year, $128 million extension with the Warriors prior to the start of last season. His performance fell off a cliff in 2022-23 with a 33.6 percent success rate from behind the arc and massive struggles on defense that made it hard for head coach Steve Kerr to trust him in big moments.

Rather than try to repair the damage done from last season, the Warriors cut bait by trading Poole to the Wizards in July. He's averaging 17.5 points on 40.8 percent shooting in 27 starts so far this season.

Even though the end of Poole's four-year tenure with Golden State on a sour note, there's still the high point of that championship run everyone can look back on fondly.