SAN FRANCISCO — But everyone knows the standings. Everyone knows the situation, the date of the trade deadline.
No matter how much veteran coaches or players like to keep an 82-game marathon in perspective and avoid riding the highs and lows of particular weeks, the Warriors are once again at an inflection point in what has already been a roller-coaster season.
Back at .500 after a 40-point blowout loss to the defending champion Celtics at Chase Center, the Warriors (21-21) have seven straight games in Northern California (six at home) before their next trip. Without both Draymond Green and Jonathan Kuminga for at least the next week, the Warriors must stay as competitive as possible or risk sinking too far out of the playoff picture to recover.
“We’ll see how we respond to it, if we can take advantage of this stretch,” Steph Curry said postgame. “Tonight was not great – Captain Obvious statement – but just the idea that we can keep ourselves afloat until we get some guys back can kind of make or break our season to be honest. I’ll keep it real.”
The Warriors play at Sacramento before hosting the Bulls on a Wednesday-Thursday back-to-back. Between now and then, they’ll try to flush the Celtics disaster down the toilet (Steve Kerr’s words).
The Bulls game starts a stretch of six straight home games, with the Lakers, Utah and Oklahoma City on a back-to-back, Phoenix and Orlando coming to town. None of those are cakewalk games — if such a thing even exists for the Warriors, who started 12-3 and are since 9-18.
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Green has been ruled out for at least the next three games before the medical staff re-evaluates his calf strain next Monday, Jan. 27. Kuminga is set to get re-evaluated this Saturday for his significant ankle sprain. He’s out of the walking boot and putting pressure on his ankle, but a weeks-long absence will likely require a ramp-up period.
The double and triple teams Curry has seen on a nightly basis are only going to get worse as they miss Kuminga and Green — a downhill scoring threat and a playmaking forward whose connection with Curry unlocks the offense in the halfcourt.
After those next seven games, the Warriors only play once more — at Utah — before the Feb. 6 trade deadline. At 21-21, they’re in 11th place in a Western Conference in which fourth and 11th are separated by five games.
Some of the most important power brokers in the organization — Curry, Kerr and Draymond Green — have publicly tipped their hand that the Warriors aren’t planning on cashing in their future first round picks or best young prospects for imperfect, win-now stars who may be available.
But the next stretch could determine whether the franchise thinks it’s even worth upgrading at the margins or shedding salary to get under the luxury tax threshold.
“We’ve been in situations where we’ve had to chase down the stretch after the All-Star break,” Curry said. “Two years of that. It takes a lot out of you. So you have to find a way to stay in the race in the standings. Nobody’s counting game by game, but a six to eight game stretch can kind of define where we are going forward for the rest of the season.”
