San Francisco Chronicle - (Sunday)
Curry’s brilliance not enough for win
Guard’s 57 points goes to waste as Doncic ties career high
Warriors guard Stephen Curry crossed the halfcourt mark midway through the third quarter, took one dribble and, from the edge of the Mavericks’ logo, drained a 3pointer.
After seeing the swish of the net, he placed his hands on his hips and shimmied his shoulders as he shook his head from side to side. It was that sort of night for the greatest shooter in NBA history. But the Warriors failed to make necessary stops down the stretch, squandering Curry’s brilliance in a 134132 loss to Dallas at American Airlines Center on Saturday.
This was difficult to stomach for a team long accustomed to parlaying Curry gems into convincing wins. Curry finished with 57 points — five shy of his career high — on 19for31 shooting (11for19 from 3point range), only for nagging issues to doom the Warriors.
Golden State was slow to get hands on shooters, particularly Mavericks guard Luke Doncic (careerhigh tying 42 points), along the perimeter as Dallas hit 21 of its 47 3point tries. With no true centers and no one taller than 6foot7, the Warriors were outrebounded 4740 — including a 156 disadvantage on the offensive glass.
Instead of staying vertical at the rim, Golden State deviated from its defensive principles again and again as it committed 24 fouls that Dallas turned into 25 made free throws. After climbing back from an early 182 deficit, the Warriors took their first lead of the game on an Andrew Wiggins 3pointer midway through
the third quarter, only for Doncic to put the Mavericks up 131124 on a 3pointer with 44.5 seconds left.
Curry hit a 3pointer, a layup and a free throw in an 11second span to cut the Warriors’ deficit to one, but Dallas forward Maxi Kleber’s 3pointer off a Doncic assist with 6.3 seconds remaining was enough for the Mavericks to escape with the victory. It marked just the second time in the eight career games in which Curry scored at least 50 points that Golden State lost.
The Warriors are now 64 this season when Curry scores 30 or more points, which is a troubling development. After Klay Thompson suffered a seasonending Achilles injury in midNovember, Golden State knew it’d need an MVPcaliber season from the face of the franchise to contend in the Western Conference. But now, nearly a third of the way through, the Warriors are just one game above .500 despite Curry pacing the NBA in 3pointers made (111) and points scored (677).
“It’s kind of a weird year,” Curry said. “I’m playing well, and we’re getting better as a team. But we’ve just got to get those wins stacked up, so we can all feel a little bit better about ourselves.”
There isn’t much more Golden State can ask from Curry, who has made at least four 3pointers in each of the past 10 games. After hitting five shots in a row from the midcourt logo during his pregame warmups Saturday, he was at the peak of his abilities, dribbling by defenders, lofting in scoop shots and sinking a slew of offkilter 3pointers. Draymond Green was a master at finding him, dishing out many of his 15 assists to his longtime buddy.
Green, whose screens also freed up Curry for numerous open looks, became the first NBA player with 15 assists, six steals and four blocks since Indiana's Jamaal Tinsley had 15 assists, six steals and five blocks on Nov. 16, 2001. But during head coach Steve Kerr’s postgame news conference, he was discussing Curry — not Green — when he used a number of superlatives: sublime, ridiculous, unfathomable.
Kerr has coached Curry through three championship runs and two MVP campaigns, but he doesn’t believe he has seen Curry play better than he has in recent weeks. This is someone who hit 105 straight 3pointers in a late-December practice. At age 32, Curry still appears to be in the heart of his physical prime.
“I didn’t realize how unique he was,” said Wiggins, who had played just one game with Curry entering this season. “I feel like he amazes every night.”
Curry joined Wilt Chamberlain on Saturday as the only Warriors players with multiple 55point games in a season. To put Curry’s dominance from beyond the arc in context, he now has nine career games with at least 11 3pointers — seven more than the two in NBA history with the next most, Klay Thompson and Damian Lillard.
But as players and Kerr struggled to find words to explain Curry’s transcendence Saturday, they were left in a familiar position: wrestling with inconsistency after following up a blowout win with a frustrating loss. The question now is what Curry’s supporting cast can do to ensure that it doesn’t waste any more of his masterpieces.
“You just want Steph to be able to celebrate with his teammates,” Kerr said. “If you win, obviously, everybody’s enjoying themselves in the locker room. The flight is amazing. Everybody’s on cloud nine. But we lost the game, and you don’t get to celebrate. That’s the way it goes.”