The Golden State Warriors can breathe a sigh of relief. The team announced that Stephen Curry, who exited Thursday night’s 117-114 win against the Toronto Raptors after taking a hard fall in the third quarter, had a clean MRI with no structural damage, and will miss the start of the team’s upcoming six-game road trip. The team is calling Curry’s injury a pelvic contusion, and he will not travel with the team to their Saturday night game against the Atlanta Hawks. He will next be reevaluated on Monday.
The injury happened when Curry attempted to drive to the basket, and as he made a pass back out to the perimeter, he got knocked onto the floor by Raptors rookie Jonathan Mogbo. He landed directly on his tailbone, and after writhing on the floor in pain for a moment, was able to walk back to the locker room under his own power.
Curry was quickly ruled out for the remainder of the game, and immediately following the win, Warriors coach Steve Kerr said that while he didn’t have an update on his star point guard, Curry did want to try and come back to play in the fourth quarter.
“He was trying to come back. He thought he might be able to come back and we just decided not to risk anything. Hopefully it’s not bad,” Kerr said via Anthony Slater of The Athletic.
Fortunately for Kerr and the Warriors it sounds as though Curry won’t miss a ton of time. Since Golden State has traded for Jimmy Butler, Curry’s been on a heater. He’s putting up 26.5 points a night, and the Warriors have gone 12-2 since the trade deadline, pushing them out of the play-in and within two games of the No. 5 spot in the Western Conference. They are still only 1.5 games ahead of the Los Angeles Clippers who sit in 7th behind them, but a favorable road trip, even without Curry, should give Golden State some breathing room.
The biggest tests will come on April 1against the Memphis Grizzlies, who hold that No. 5 spot in the West, and April 3 against the Los Angeles Lakers on the road. However, given that Curry is being reevaluated on Monday, he could be back for those games.
The other thing to keep an eye on with Curry’s status going forward is he needs to play in at least five of Golden State’s 12 remaining games on the schedule to remain eligible for end-of-season awards like the All-NBA Teams. As long as this injury doesn’t keep him out longer than expected, he should get there. Curry, averaging 24.2 points and 6.0 assists per game on 39.4% 3-point shooting over the course of the season, has a strong All-NBA case.
This injury isn’t catastrophic for the Warriors, who have been rejuvenated since trading for Butler. His addition relieves some of that offensive pressure on Curry and only strengthens Golden State’s top-10 defense. With Curry out for potentially the next few games, the Warriors will need Butler to step up on offense to carry some of that load.
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