SAN FRANCISCO – For the first six and half minutes of the second quarter, the two biggest superstars of Friday night’s Warriors game against the Denver Nuggets, Steph Curry and Nikola Jokić, were either sitting on the bench or waiting their turn at the scorer’s table.
It was up to their teammates to either carry the load or crumble without them. The Warriors hadn’t beat the Nuggets since the 2022 NBA playoffs. These two teams had played nine games since then, including six on Golden State’s home court at Chase Center, and all nine ended in the Nuggets’ favor.
Behind Curry’s 36 points, the Warriors finally overcame their Denver demons to the roaring tune of a 118-104 win. First, it all began without Curry.
Having to rally back from a 10-point deficit after the first quarter, the second quarter began without Curry and Jokić on the floor. If the Nuggets took advantage of Curry’s absence, the Warriors could have found themselves in an impossible hole to climb out of on the second night of a back-to-back in which they came home from a six-game road trip that spanned two weeks.
Instead, the Warriors opened with a 7-0 run through the first three-plus minutes of the second quarter, bringing them within three points of the Nuggets, prompting a timeout from Denver coach Michael Malone.
The Nuggets didn’t score until more than four minutes had passed in the second quarter. Upping the intensity and finding their second wind, the Warriors’ defense held the Nuggets to only 16 second-quarter points. All season long, opponents have crossed their fingers in hopes of slowing down Denver’s offense just enough, knowing fully stopping them almost never was going to happen.
They shot 35 percent from the field in the second quarter (7 of 20) and went 2 of 10 from 3-point range. What changed?
“Just our physicality,” Warriors coach Steve Kerr said. “I thought we got into the ball, were more physical. The first quarter they were just doing anything they wanted. Jokić was incredible. They were hitting everything. Started forcing turnovers.
“We forced 26 for the game, and it felt like the second quarter is when it changed.”
Through the first 12 minutes, aside from a short stretch, the Warriors and Nuggets traded buckets. The Warriors scored a respectable 34 points in the opening frame on 54.5-percent shooting (12 of 22) and made half of their threes (4 of 8). But the Nuggets were even better, dropping 44 points on an absurd 70.8-percent clip and also shot 50 percent on 3-pointers (3 of 6).
Denver’s size advantage saw them score 26 of its 44 first-quarter points in the paint. The Nuggets then only scored eight points in the paint during the second quarter.
“They started to feel us,” Draymond Green said. “That first quarter was kind of a track meet. You shoot, I shoot. Whoever made the most shots won the quarter. They did, and we gave them 44 points. But we got our defense settled in to start the second quarter, and then when the group came back they continued it for the rest of the quarter. Sixteen-point quarter was huge.
“Once we got the 44 under control I think we pretty much took care of them the rest of the game.”
While Curry watched from the sidelines, a group of Green, Brandin Podziemski, Jimmy Butler, Moses Moody and Quinten Post shined. By the time Curry came back, as well as Jokic, the Warriors only trailed by one point with five minutes and 33 seconds left in the first half.
Everybody was part of the action during that span. No one player went on a major scoring run.
Butler scored four points, Moody had three, Post had three, and both Green and Podziemski each contributed two points. The Warriors had a 14-5 advantage to begin the second quarter once Curry was back.
“That’s been a really good lineup for us since we got Jimmy,” Kerr said. “That top of the second, top of the fourth lineup. It’s been very effective against everybody.”
Defense fuels the five-man unit. The spacing Post provides as a 7-footer gives Butler the necessary room to work with. And when Podziemski shoots like he has the last two games, making 12 threes and scoring 54 points, it’s going to be a tough group to beat for any team.
They played a tad under 10 minutes together overall and were a plus-10, outscoring the Nuggets 22-12.
Green, however, has an even simpler answer than Kerr.
“Jimmy Butler,” Green said. “Got another one in that group. That group has struggled at times because we just – no No. 1 out there. We got a one now. … Yeah, we added Jimmy Butler to that group and he changes everything.”
But who are we kidding? This team still jumps on the back of Curry and rides him to the finish line.
Curry in the final five and a half minutes of the second quarter scored 12 points. Jokic scored two. The Warriors as a whole scored 32, putting them ahead by six points going into halftime.
Jokic then exploded for 14 points in the third quarter, five more than Curry’s nine points, only for Steph to outscore him 8-2 in the fourth quarter.
The Warriors know the back and forth nature of the Western Conference standings. They understand what they must do to avoid the dreaded play-in tournament. And Curry, he was well aware of the Warriors’ losing streak to the Nuggets and what a win over them would mean spiritually for a team to take down three of the conference’s best in a grueling gauntlet of the schedule.
“We knew about the streak for sure,” he said. “It is a little extra motivation of needing a win to stand pat in the standings. And just the idea that it’s a back-to-back and everybody talks a little about schedule losses and all that type of stuff. We wanted to rise to the level of the challenge of coming off a six-game, 13-day road trip and getting a good night sleep in your bed.
“But you got to go back to work and perform, and we did that. It’s nice to beat those guys, because it’s been rough.”
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