Warriors rally to beat Bulls, Spurs rout Hornets

LOS ANGELES: Golden State stars Klay Thompson and Stephen Curry shook off slow starts to power the Warriors to a much-needed 140-131 NBA victory over the Chicago Bulls on Friday. Coming off two blowout losses to cap a 2-5 homestand, the Warriors got off to another ugly start in Chicago.

Trailing 75-62 at halftime, the Warriors turned it around with 48 points in the third quarter. Thompson connected on five-of-five from three-point range on the way to 17 points in the period, the shooting guard’s highest-scoring quarter of the season.

“I think we got off-track emotionally, spiritually, the last couple games,” Warriors coach Steve Kerr said. “Our fans could feel it. We got booed for the first time since I’ve been here, and as I said both nights, we deserved it because our energy and our competitive spirit was not there.

“We found that again tonight,” Kerr said. Golden State led by 15 going into the fourth, but the Bulls, who honored their 1995-96 championship team before the game, cut the deficit to four with less than three minutes to play before the Warriors pulled away again.

Thompson finished with 30 points and six assists and Curry added 27 points despite another tough shooting night that saw him make just eight of 24 shots from the field. “Klay was brilliant,” Kerr said. “When he keeps it simple like that and just shoots when he’s open and keeps moving the ball, that’s when he’s at his best.”

Curry added nine assists and Jonathan Kuminga added 24 points off the bench for the Warriors, who had just five turnovers and withstood a 39-point performance from Chicago’s DeMar DeRozan. In San Antonio, rookie star Victor Wembanyama scored 26 points and pulled down 11 rebounds in the Spurs’ 135-99 rout of the Charlotte Hornets.

In less than 20 minutes on the floor, French prodigy Wembanyama connected on nine of 14 shots—including a pair of alley-oop dunks and a one-handed jam to start the second half. The Spurs spoiled the return from a 20-game injury absence of Hornets star LaMelo Ball, who had 28 points, five assists and five steals in his first game since November. Houston guard Fred VanVleet scored 17 of his 20 points in the second half to help the Rockets edge the Pistons 112-110 in Detroit. The Pistons dropped their seventh straight since snapping their record-equalling 28-game losing streak.