Stephen Curry scores 24, Jimmy Butler gets triple-double, Warriors beat Blazers for 5th straight win
SAN FRANCISCO — — Stephen Curry scored 24 points and moved within two 3-pointers of becoming the first player in NBA history with 4,000, Jimmy Butler had a triple-double, and the surging Golden State Warriors won their fifth straight game by beating the Portland Trail Blazers 130-120 on Monday night.
Curry, who became the 26th player in NBA history to score 25,000 points during Saturday’s win against Detroit, needed seven 3s to reach the milestone. He made his first two early then another three in the third.
Butler contributed 15 points, 10 assists and 10 rebounds for the Warriors’ first triple-double this season. Golden State improved to 12-2 since Butler made his debut Feb. 8 and 12-1 in games he played.
Gary Payton II scored a career-high 26 points in the Warriors’ 10th win in their last 11 games.
Deni Avdija returned from a two-game absence with a leg injury to record season-bests of 34 points, 16 rebounds and six assists in the Blazers’ fourth straight defeat. He’s the first Blazer since Clyde Drexler on March 20, 1990, with that stat line.
Anfernee Simons added 32 points as Portland completed a back-to-back following a 119-112 home loss to the Pistons on Sunday.
Takeaways
Trail Blazers: Jerami Grant was sidelined for another game because of his troublesome right knee.
Warriors: Brandin Podziemski missed a second straight game with low back soreness that forced him out late in the first quarter at Brooklyn on March 6.
Key moment
Butler pulled down an offensive rebound with 3:33 remaining to give him his 18th career triple-double in the regular season and 21st overall.
Key stat
Golden State shot 51.2% from 3-point range, with Buddy Hield knocking down six 3s, Payton with four and three for 7-foot big man Quinten Post.
Up next
The Blazers return home to face the Knicks on Wednesday, while the Warriors host their Northern California rival Sacramento Kings on Thursday to continue a seven-game homestand.
——
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GS leads 2-0
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | T | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| POR | 27 | 22 | 43 | 28 | 120 |
| GS | 35 | 33 | 34 | 28 | 130 |
| Team | W | L | PCT | GB | STRK |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Oklahoma City | 53 | 12 | .815 | – | L1 |
| Denver | 42 | 23 | .646 | 11 | W1 |
| Minnesota | 37 | 29 | .561 | 16.5 | W5 |
| Portland | 28 | 38 | .424 | 25.5 | L4 |
| Utah | 15 | 50 | .231 | 38 | L6 |
| Team | W | L | PCT | GB | STRK |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| LA Lakers | 40 | 23 | .635 | – | L2 |
| Golden State | 37 | 28 | .569 | 4 | W5 |
| LA Clippers | 35 | 29 | .547 | 5.5 | W3 |
| Sacramento | 33 | 31 | .516 | 7.5 | L2 |
| Phoenix | 30 | 35 | .462 | 11 | L1 |
Warriors’ bench carries them to victory against Trail Blazers
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Gary Payton II and Buddy Hield to the rescue!
When you win 10 out of 11 games, as the Golden State Warriors have done, there’s no singular script for success. You have to find multiple ways to win games. Some are pretty, some are ugly; some dramatic, and some stress free. On Monday night, the Dubs tried a new way to win en route to a 130-120 victory over the Portland Trail Blazers: a two-man bench mob.
Raise your hand if you predicted Gary Payton II to score his single-game career high, or for he and the recently-slumping Buddy Hield to combine for 46 highly-efficient points.
The starters were good, but Portland kept pace with them. The Warriors only outscored the Blazers by six points when Steph Curry was on the court, and only by four points when Draymond Green was. It was just a one-point positive margin when Jimmy Butler III was on the hardwood, and the Dubs were outscored when playing Moses Moody and Quinten Post.
But they bested the Blazers by 16 points when Hield had checked in, and by 14 when Payton was on the court, with the other two bench players — Gui Santos (+7) and Kevon Looney (+6) — also getting in on the plus/minus fun.
It was a slowish start, which wasn’t too surprising. If there’s one thing the Blazers can do, it’s play with energy, and they’ve slowly turned into a fairly decent team: they brought a 14-9 record since mid-January into the Chase Center on Monday. And so it wasn’t shocking — though it was disappointing — when Portland flew all over the court and immediately built up a 7-0 lead.
The Dubs answered back thanks to an unlikely source: Post. The rookie center drained a pair of early and was a menace inside, with a key block and some tough rebounds. The Dubs started to out-execute the Blazers, but Portland’s combination of effort, athleticism, and shooting was keeping them in it. Still and all, Golden State managed a 35-27 lead after the first quarter, and a Hield three to start the second made it an 11-point game.
But the Blazers had no intentions of disappearing. They had an answer for every Warriors run, and though they couldn’t re-take the lead in the quarter, they repeatedly would cut into the deficit, just to see the Warriors build it back up again.
Some beeves are petty, some beeves start small and linger, but the Nikola Jokic-Markieff Morris beef was different. It started when one giant shoved a slightly smaller giant really, really hard. It was quite shocking for me, a non-giant, to watch, and based on Markeiff Morris being out for 58 games with whiplash after the shove, it was pretty shocking for him as well. Now, consider the fact that both beef participants are extremely close with their brothers. And also that their brothers are known for shows of aggression and being strong and one used to be a professional MMA fighter. And you’ve got yourself a beefball with no filler, no biding agent, just beef.
With Butler quietly operating like a brilliant chess player controlling the offense and defense, Payton and Hield got to work, seemingly scoring every time they touched the ball — they combined to shoot 5-for-6 from deep in the frame.
Golden State had pushed the lead comfortably to double digits when the final minute of the half rolled around, and then it ended on a brilliant two-for-one. After Payton had outworked multiple Blazers to grab a loose ball, he attempted — while laying on the ground — to save the ball to Green, but the officials ruled that the ball had gone out of bounds. Green was adamant that it had not, so Steve Kerr called for a challenge. The Warriors won the challenge, and Payton drained a three a few seconds later. They forced a steal on the other end, and Moody sank a layup in transition with less than a second remaining to give the Dubs a commanding 68-49 lead at the break.
I’ll be honest: I thought the game was over at that point. It sure seemed like the Warriors were going to coast against a lesser team that was on the road and playing a back-to-back. The Blazers had no such plans though. They came out of the locker rooms with the energy of a 16-seed smelling blood in the first round of March Madness. Through sheer will and energy they opened the quarter on a 16-5 run, and suddenly it was a game again. Yet every time they got close — and my goodness did they get close — the Warriors had an answer. But the game hung in the balance, decided by only a few possessions for the bulk of the quarter.
Finally, Curry put on the superhero mask that he had donned during the road trip, and started to make impossible shot after impossible shot, firing up his teammates and fans along the way. Suddenly the lead was back to double digits. Naturally, though, the Blazers cut it right back to four points, but the Warriors ended on a run, and led 102-92 going into the fourth.
And that quarter was, blissfully, stress-free. Payton and Hield again caught fire, leading an explosive offensive charge with transition buckets, gorgeous jump-shots, and timely cuts. The Warriors were playing without a care (in the good way), and were having all sorts of fun as the lead grew to 17 points.
The Blazers would make some more shots, but they had no sustained run left in them. Golden State controlled the action the rest of the way, never dealing with much of a scare, and winning 130-120.
Payton led the Warriors with 26 points on 11-for-16 shooting, including 4-for-6 from deep, as he continued his recent scoring surge. Hield caught fire and played brilliantly within the system, needing just 10 shots to score 20 points, and dishing seven assists as well. Curry (24) and Moody (20) made it a quartet of efficient 20-point scorers as the Dubs moved to 37-28 on the season, and held strong in the sixth spot in the West. While those four put up the gaudy scoring numbers, Butler quietly achieved his first triple-double with the Warriors, netting 17 points, 10 rebounds, and 10 assists.
But the story was the bench. In a game ultimately decided by just 10 points, the Dubs outscored the Blazers 56-23 in bench points.
There are a whole lot of ways to win. We’ll get to see what method the Warriors choose when the return to action on Thursday to host the Sacramento Kings.
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What we learned as GP2’s career night fuels Warriors’ win originally appeared on NBC Sports Bay Area
BOX SCORE
SAN FRANCISCO – The Warriors on Monday night at Chase Center were reminded that every quarter counts.
They played phenomenal two-way basketball against the Portland Trail Blazers in the first half to hold a 19-point lead, 68-49, but came out flat in the third quarter where they were outscored 43-34. Message received.
Both teams scored 28 points in the fourth quarter, showing how important the Warriors’ great first half was for a 130-120 win.
The star of the night somehow wasn’t Steph Curry. It wasn’t Jimmy Butler, nor was it Draymond Green. That title belonged to Gary Payton II.
Playing against his former team that gave him a hefty paycheck after the Warriors’ 2022 NBA championship season, Payton was nothing short of spectacular. Payton was a marksman from 3-point range, a menace defensively, threw down a crowd-pleasing dunk and even showed off some wild acrobatics.
Payton in 28 minutes off the bench scored a career-high 26 points, going 11 of 16 from the field and 4 of 6 on threes. Monday night marked his first 20-point game since December of 2021.
Steph Curry scored 24 points and fell two 3-pointers shy of 4,000 for his career. Moses Moody and Buddy Hield also added 20 points, and Butler put together a 15-point, 10-rebound, 10-assist triple-double.
Here are three takeaways from the Warriors’ fifth consecutive win.
On a night where everybody waited to see if Curry would make his 4,000th career 3-pointer, Payton stole the show from downtown. Whenever he makes a single three, it’s an added bonus. If Payton is draining multiple shots from behind the 3-point line, it’s almost a guarantee the Warriors are cooking offensively.
Payton in the first quarter scored seven points off the bench, with the lefty making his lone 3-point attempt, cashing in from the right corner. The second quarter, where the Warriors outscored the Blazers 33-22, is when Payton really began to heat up.
He took four threes and was successful on three of them, doing so from the left corner, right corner and the top of the arc. His four threes in the first half matched a career high for an entire game, and Payton’s 16 points going into halftime tied his season high for a game.
Payton’s first 3-point of the second half attempt looked right on track, only for it to rattle out. But on the Warriors’ next possession, a layup gave Payton a season-high 18 points. Another eight points in the fourth quarter brought Payton to his career high.
A battle between rookie starting centers featured the No. 7 overall pick in the 2024 NBA Draft and one taken 45 picks later at No. 52 overall. Quinten Post, the Warriors’ second-round gem, quickly found out why Donovan Clingan was such a hot commodity coming into the draft.
Clingan on the Warriors’ opening possession blocked Post’s attempt at a hook shot, only to swat him again around the rim a little over one minute later. But Post then showed off his main skill the next time the Warriors had the ball, burying a 3-pointer.
Their styles are complete opposites. Yet, both refuse to be punked. The two even got tangled up within the first two minutes of the second quarter, and Post showed he can do what Clingan does best, too. In his first 10 minutes of play, Post already was up to a career-high three blocked shots.
Post showed some frustrations with his faults and was a minus-2 in 25 minutes, scoring 11 points, as well as seven rebounds and four blocked shots. Clingan also blocked four shots but was a plus-4 in 32 minutes with 15 points, nine rebounds and six assists.
No player has brought Warriors fans more frustration this season than Hield. When he’s hot, the Warriors are a problem for any team in the NBA. When he’s off … he’s way off.
There were few reasons, if any, to complain about Hield’s performance against Portland.
His 3-point shot was money, making six of his nine attempts, which gave Hield his most threes in a game since Dec. 8. Hield also provided much more than the long ball. He dished out a season-high seven assists, plus had two rebounds, two steals and one block. Hield was a plus-16 in 25 minutes off the bench, giving him one of his best overall games of the season. While the Blazers scored a total of 23 points off the bench, Hield and Payton alone combined for 46.
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