Warriors win against OKC reveals silver lining to Steph Curry’s absence

SAN FRANCISCO — In theory, Steph Curry’s extended absence could send this Warriors season tumbling into lottery team land.

By Draymond Green’s calculation, Curry generates around 60 points of the Warriors’ offense on a nightly basis between his scoring, passing and opposing team mistakes he can generate. That kind of production can’t be replaced, and the 28-26 Warriors are a bad losing streak away from the Western Conference’s cellar and a win streak away from a top five seed. An unideal time to be without your best player.

But the Warriors’ 141-114 win over Oklahoma City on Monday night revealed a hidden benefit to Curry’s absence.

Without Curry, the Warriors absolutely have to play mistake-free, locked-in basketball. They have to play within themselves and by self-imposed rules that become a luxury when Curry plays.

Lack of focus has kept the Warriors stuck in the middle of the pack. Now they have to focus.

“With Steph, you don’t have to be so on, if that makes sense,” Green said. “You can let the game take its path and then you can settle the game down. But for the most part you can just let the game take its path and play off Steph.”

Curry’s magic is his ability to erase deficits within a matter of minutes and will the Warriors to wins. Without that luxurious safety net, his teammates have to take special care of leads.

“Steve always calls it organized chaos when Steph is out there, and we don’t have that when Steph is out so we have to stay organized,” Green said. “It’s hard to have those laws when Steph is here because he can just bail us out and when he’s not it’s much tougher to do that.”

If the Warriors can replicate their Monday night performance, they may be able to position themselves well in a jam-packed Western Conference upon Curry’s return from a leg sprain (which is yet to be determined).

Klay Thompson did his part to make up for Curry’s scoring, hitting 12 3-pointers in a 42-point game. Seven of those 3s came in the first half.

“It felt great, but what felt better was the 43 team assists we had and only 16 turnovers,” Thompson said. “That was the indicator of how the night went, it has to be the most we had all season and the ball was humming. When we do that, we’re our best.

I’m a huge beneficiary of when the ball is moving. What the naysayers say, that’s fine, but we have a lot of guys who are greedy and we’re not going to quit because our best player is out.”

Twelve of those 43 assists came from Jordan Poole, who had what coach Steve Kerr said was Poole’s best game of the year. He’s getting defended like Curry and starting to play like Curry with the ball in his hand. That meant seeking out Thompson and his teammates and letting scoring opportunities come to him; he was thinking fast, but played slower and didn’t force feed passes or over-dribble and turn the ball over.

“He had four turnovers but three of them was understanding what was going on in the game and trying to get Klay shots,” Green said. “So realistically he had one turnover and 13 assists. I thought he played an incredible game on both sides of the ball.”

Poole’s favorite assist: Off an offensive rebound, Poole had a heads-up pass to Kevon Looney under the basket Looney scored an easy dunk off. In that split second, Josh Giddey was in no-man’s land on defense, Poole and Looney were on the same page.

“That happened twice this year already,” Poole said. “Loon missed the first one and JaMychal (Green) missed the second one, but today Loon caught it.”

Poole finished with 21 points and was a team-high plus-28 in his 29 minutes. Andrew Wiggins had the team’s second-highest plus-minus with plus-25 — his best game since he returned from an adductor strain and illness on Jan. 7.

Wiggins’ 18 points, four assists and three rebounds don’t stand out, but he played some of his best defense of the entire year and helped hold Oklahoma City star Shai Gilgeous-Alexander to 20 points on 6-of-16 shooting.

Kerr called the win a “blast” to watch. A season defined by late blown leads, shaky wins and ugly losses, the Warriors managed to beat a contending playoff team by a substantial margin. If they can keep that focus, not only will they survive without Curry, but perhaps be able to escape mediocrity when he returns.

“You either understand that now and play that way or we’ll lose,” Green said. “We want to make sure to leave this team in a better position we were in when Steph went out. That’s the goal.”