Warriors:
Stephen Curry, left, and Golden State see their 10-game winning streak end in Brooklyn.
BROOKLYN — It’s depressing how the most recent four minutes can find a way to taint the previous 332.
The Warriors collapsed in the final four minutes of the finale of their seven-game road trip, losing 102-98 to Brooklyn and leaving the Barclays Center on Wednesday having trouble remembering the brilliant basketball they had played for the rest of the trip.
“It’s very disappointing,” said Warriors point guard Stephen Curry, who scored a game-high 34 points to go with seven assists, five rebounds, three steals and seven turnovers. “Our vision was set on finishing off the road trip with a win and what that
would mean.”
It would have meant a lot. If the Warriors (24-14) had prevailed in Brooklyn, they would have had 11 straight wins, tying the franchise’s best winning streak — set during the 1971-72 season — and matching San Antonio and Portland for the longest runs in the NBA this season.
A win against the Nets would have marked the Warriors’ eighth consecutive road victory, which would have set the best stretch in franchise history — passing the seven-game streak set in 1969 — and would have made them the NBA’s first team ever to sweep a sevengame trip.
“We’re disappointed that we did not finish it up the right way,” Warriors head coach Mark Jackson said. “But the history we’re chasing after is bigger than a record for a seven-game road trip.”
Instead, it was the Nets (14-21), who were celebrating their first four-game winning streak of the season. Playing without All-Star point guard Deron Williams, who has a sprained left ankle, and All-Star center Robin Lopez, who has a broken right foot, Brooklyn overcame a 16-point, firstquarter deficit and then rallied from down four in the final four minutes.
There were five ties and five leads changes in the opening eight minutes of the fourth quarter. Klay Thompson drilled a three-pointer to put the Warriors ahead 93-89 with 4:06 left. That was about it for Golden State.
During the next 4:01, the Warriors went 0-for-6 from the field — including settling for and missing four three-point tries — and committed two turnovers. Still, the Warriors had two chances to make game-tying three-pointers after the Nets went ahead 96-93 on two Joe Johnson free throws with 60 seconds to go, but Andre Iguodala had the ball stolen on the first possession and Curry passed the ball to Brooklyn’s Kevin Garnett on the second.
“It was a long road trip, but we can’t let that be an excuse for how the game ended,” Curry said.
Warriors forward David Lee had 20 points, seven rebounds and five turnovers, Thompson added 14 points and center Andrew Bogut had 10 points, nine rebounds, two blocked shots and a steal.
Those types of numbers had been enough during the first six games of the trip, and the Warriors appeared well on their way to making history Wednesday. They bolted to a 32-16 lead on a three-pointer by Harrison Barnes with 1:43 remaining in the first quarter.
Brooklyn then put together a 20-5 run that spanned the first and second quarters to trim the deficit to 37-36 on a Jason Terry three with 7:35 to go in the half.
Garnett gave Brooklyn its first lead since the game’s opening 2½ minutes when his 18-foot jumper made it 47-46 with 3:22 left in the second quarter. The Nets stretched their lead to 59-52 when Mirza Teletovic banked in a 30-footer to beat the halftime buzzer.
“We got off to a great start, and at that point, we needed to run away with the game,” Lee said. “When you give life to a team with this many veterans and with this many guys who have played on winning teams, you’re in some dangerous territory.”