“It was just the compassion of knowing that he couldn’t get out there”.
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No Stephen Curry turned out to be better than a hobbling Stephen Curry. He briefly warmed up and said he could play before a team doctor, team trainer and Kerr intervened. However, so far in the playoffs, Curry has already suffered through a pair of injuries, which would make it more hard for the Warriors to end its dream season with a championship defense.
“He was standing there crying, you know, and like, ‘Dog, just get out of here”.
Warriors Coach Steve Kerr said that Curry tweaked “the inside part” of his knee, and that he slipped on a wet spot on the floor.
“Hopefully, he’ll be OK before too long”. “I just told him we’ve got him”.
The Warriors didn’t need Curry to take care of the Rockets, who are about as resilient as a roll of gas station toilet paper, scoring 121 points to win their third game of the series. Klay Thompson made four of his seven three-pointers in the third as the Warriors made a franchise playoff-record eight in that quarter en route to an National Basketball Association playoff-record 21.
“It was their call”, Curry said on Friday, via ESPN.
Said Andrew Bogut: “We weren’t around here lighting candles and holding hands”.
Thompson scored a game-high 23 points, hitting seven 3-pointers one game after missing each of his seven attempts from beyond the arc. “But the fact that he was in such a great groove, just throughout this whole series, we rode his coattails, we rode [Kevin Love], and I was able to focus on some other things, especially my rebounding, get guys involved – defensively, just try to lock in on my individual matchup”.
-Pride over that thunderous, propulsive second half-which started only moments after an emotional Curry walked off the court after testing out his knee-when Klay Thompson and Draymond Green demolished Houston’s defense and everybody in blue clamped down the Rockets. Patrick Beverley strained his right leg, and the team announced before the start of the second half that he would not return. Curry has missed the last two games of the series, including the Game 3 loss that has now made it a more competitive series.
The Warriors still roasted the Rockets. Green had seven turnovers, including the one that cost the Warriors a final shot at the win. “When it’s called upon, they can still go to it, and they did that tonight”.
That would make Curry’s earliest possible return in Game 5 but Golden State could be forced to go the entire round without him, which could open a path for teams like San Antonio, Oklahoma City, the Clippers or Cleveland to win the title. “They ain’t laying down”, he said. I’m not making any diagnoses-without a medical degree, being there or looking at any of the charts, and even then nobody’s going to know anything complete until after the MRI scheduled tomorrow.
James Harden added 18 points, but was held to 4-for-13 shooting.
“Terrible way, awful way, bad way to lose. just a bad quarter and that’s what gave the game away”, Harden said.
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The very same Dwight Howard who gave up on the team in the elimination game of the series, getting ejected in the third quarter, yelling at Mitch Kupchak on his way out.
