Curry’s torrid stretch fizzles in fourth quarter
Warriors guard Stephen Curry’s recent scoring surge — a fiveweek stretch that featured six 40point games — left many to question whether he was human.
But in struggling down the stretch of the Warriors’ 108103 loss to the Pelicans at Smoothie King Center on Tuesday night, Curry showed that, yes, even he is prone to the occasional rough quarter. After scoring 35 points on 12for24 shooting (8for16 from 3point range) over the first three quarters, he had just two points on 1for7 shooting (0for4 from 3point range) in the final 12 minutes.
“I thought he got decent shots down the
stretch,” Warriors head coach Steve Kerr said of Curry. “Not wideopen looks, but shots that were makeable. They just didn’t go down. It happens.”
With Curry missing 10 of 11 shots to close the game, the Warriors labored offensively, giving up a 135 run over the last threeplus minutes to slide back to .500. With just six games left, Golden State now has almost no chance of securing the seventh spot in the Western Conference standings for homecourt advantage throughout the playin tournament.
It is 31⁄2 games behind seventhplace Portland and tied with Memphis for eighth. The Warriors’ best hope is to secure the eighth spot, which would give them two chances to win one game in the playin and earn a playoff berth.
To do that, Golden State will need Curry to play better in crunch time than he did Tuesday. Late in the third quarter, with Curry looking poised to eclipse the 40point mark for the seventh time in 16 games, the lights at Smoothie King Center went out and forced a stoppage in play.
The disruption appeared to throw Curry out of rhythm. Time and again, he missed open shots. Guard Andrew Wiggins scored eight of his 26 points early in the fourth quarter to give the Warriors a sixpoint cushion. But as Curry’s misses mounted, his teammates were slow to rotate defensively and run back in transition.
After forward Draymond Green’s driving layup tied the game at 100100 with 49 seconds left, the Warriors surrendered eight straight points. New Orleans, which sits two games behind 10thplace San Antonio in the standings, kept alive its hopes of sneaking into the playin.
This was a sobering way for Golden State to follow up Monday’s 123108 win over those same Pelicans, but the Warriors hardly pondered whatifs postgame. Unlike many losses this season, when they made headscratching mistakes to fumble away winnable games, the injurythinned Warriors simply didn’t have enough collective energy late to overcome a rare offshooting stretch from Curry.
“I like the vibe we have now in how we’re trying to play and the intensity we’re trying to come with every night,” Curry said. “We know we’re slowly getting closer and closer to the games that really matter.”
Having gone 22 on their final trip of the regular season, the Warriors return to San Francisco to close with a sixgame homestand. After games Thursday and Saturday against the lotterybound Thunder, Golden State faces four playoff contenders, including Utah and Phoenix — the two teams tied atop the West standings.
Though the Warriors are pleased to come back to friendly confines, they recognize that Chase Center can breed a false sense of security.
The Warriors might have solidified a spot in the playin tournament, but they have bigger goals.
“We’ve just got to win these games, get some momentum going and be ready,” forward Juan ToscanoAnderson said. “I think right now is the best time to have some momentum going into the postseason.”