SAN FRANCISCO — Steph Curry sprained the thumb on his shooting hand in the Warriors’ most recent game against the Cavaliers, putting him on the official injury report.
It was impossible to tell on Thursday night.
Playing with his thumb wrapped, Curry drained all eight of his 3-pointers. He finished with 30 points, 10 assists and six rebounds.
The Warriors won his minutes by 32 points. He has the NBA record for games with at least eight 3-pointers, but he’d never made that many without missing a single one. His previous record for perfect 3-point shooting was 6-for-6.
The 76ers had their entire big three of Joel Embiid, Tyrese Maxey and Paul George healthy for a change, but the Warriors (17-16) embarrassed them, 139-105. Curry led the charge as the Warriors shared the ball beautifully, played with pace and tamed Philadelphia’s three-headed monster.
In the Warriors’ highest-scoring game since the season opener, they assisted on 42 of their 52 made field goals. Golden State shot a scorching 60.9% from the field and 56.4% from behind the arc.
Heading into 2025, the Warriors were optimistic they could put their roster-wide shooting woes behind them. The win over Philadelphia certainly looked like proof of concept.
Dennis Schroder, who has struggled mightily on offense in his first few weeks as a Warrior, drained each of his first three 3-pointers. Jonathan Kuminga (20 points, five assists, five rebounds) hit a yank-back 3 over Joel Embiid as part of a seven-point burst in three minutes. Moses Moody made another to break Philadelphia’s zone. Even Buddy Hield, who had sank just two of his last 25 3-pointers, canned a corner 3.
The Warriors shot 7-for-11 from deep in a 35-19 first quarter. On the other end, the Sixers sure looked like they were on the second night of a back-to-back. A step slow and uncalibrated, Philadelphia missed their first seven 3s and Embiid went 2-for-6 from the floor against Trayce Jackson-Davis and Draymond Green.
Steve Kerr wants to keep the current starting lineup — and substitutions behind it — mostly intact for the time being. Evne against Embiid, bigs Kevon Looney and Kyle Anderson remained out of the rotation.
Part of the biggest keys with the current rotation is featuring Kuminga in various ways: as the focal point of the second unit, alongside Steph Curry and Green as a slasher and while playing starter’s minutes.
With the ball in his hands more often, Kuminga has had arguably the best few weeks of his career. On Thursday, he dished four assists in his first stint (and could’ve had two more).
Even when the Sixers found their outside stroke, the Warriors kept pace, taking a 16-point lead into halftime. Their small-ball lineup with Kuminga at power forward next to Green generated a myriad of clean looks, especially against Philadelphia’s zone. Golden State had 22 assists on 26 buckets in the first half.
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As they were hitting shots, the Warriors could feasibly play smaller even against 76er lineups with Embiid and Guerschon Yabusele. They drew those bigs away from the paint and worked outside-in.
Like always, it started with Curry. He hit his first six 3-pointers, including a banked-in heat check over Paul George. After that somehow went down, he put his hands on his head in disbelief.
During Curry’s flurry, Kerr tried to sub him out. Curry refused and proceeded to continue raining in shots.
The next possession, he skipped back on defense after threading a cross-court dime to Andrew Wiggins in the corner. Then he hit a step-back two over Eric Gordon to put the Warriors up 25 — then their biggest lead of the night.
Curry scored 13 in the third quarter, planting the Sixers way back on their heels. Just for the fun of it, Curry nailed two more 3s minutes into the fourth quarter, pushing both his scoring total and Golden State’s lead to 30. He and the rest of Golden State’s regulars watched the last eight minutes of the game from the bench.
