Curry, Hield lead Warriors past Blazers to open season with blowout win
PORTLAND, Ore. — The Trail Blazers’ pregame hype video was narrated by Bruce Lee’s famous “Be water, my friend” quote.
Empty your mind, be formless. Shapeless, like water.
The game didn’t exactly flow like water, but the tide eventually turned the Warriors’ way. The matchup featured Golden State missing its first eight field goal attempts, Draymond Green’s first technical foul of the season, 33 combined turnovers and Portland going 8-for-34 from 3, and it ended in the Warriors coasting through the second half.
Golden State ultimately wore down the Blazers with its up-tempo style and depth. They didn’t face their toughest of tests, but the Warriors opened their 2024-25 season — and a new stage of their dynastic arc — with a 139-104 blowout victory.
Against the Portland Trail Blazers, who are expected to be among the worst teams in the league, the Warriors struggled at first to create separation, but took a 12-point lead into halftime and ballooned it to 29.
Steph Curry (17 points, 10 assists, nine rebounds), came a board shy of his 11th career triple-double in his franchise record-extending 16th opening night. Buddy Hield poured in a team-high 22 points in 15 minutes and Andrew Wiggins added 20 on 8-for-15 shooting. The Warriors, who have emphasized volume 3-point shooting, made 20 of their 48 3s (41.7%). And their depth, lauded as the club’s greatest strength, showed as their bench outscored Portland’s 70-37.
“Everybody’s unselfish,” Hield said postgame. “Play basketball the right way. Next pass, next shot available, everybody can shoot it. Everybody’s heart is in the right place. Offense and defense, playing together. It starts with our leaders like Steph and Dray. Everybody just follows them, and Steve, of course, putting everything together.”
In an era without Klay Thompson, and with a variety of new faces both on the court and on the bench, Golden State started Steph Curry, Andrew Wiggins, Jonathan Kuminga, Draymond Green and Trayce Jackson-Davis in an effort to shift toward a more defensive-minded identity.
The opening group fell behind 12-3 while clanking its first eight shots. Curry misfired on a pair of open looks, but the spacing concerns of that combination bore out.
Steve Kerr used 11 players in the first quarter alone, then started Moses Moody — the odd-man out in the opening period — to start the second quarter. Kerr said he decided to go to a 12-man rotation on Tuesday, the night before the first game of the season.
“I’ve never played 12 before, but we’re going to do it,” Kerr said. “It’s not easy on anybody, but we’ve just got to trust that from one night to the next, we’re going to find combinations that really work. And the guys have to understand that some nights are their night, some nights are not. And that’s okay as long as we continue to play together and play hard. I think it’s going to be a really fun team to watch for our fans.”
Hield, one of three new veterans on the team, provided a jolt off the bench. He hit four of his first six 3-point attempts, registering 14 points in 10 first-half minutes. He was a part of Golden State’s bench units that picked up from where the starters slacked and put the Warriors ahead.
As the Warriors picked up momentum, the game sped up. They want to play fast, and they want to jack up their volume of 3s, and they accomplished both. Still, transition possessions often ended in missed layups or turnovers, and 3s — even open ones — often went awry.
With the game’s sea level rising in the second quarter, it crashed at Draymond Green’s feet. Deni Avdija, out of control on a fast break, got tripped up into Green, whose elbow connected with the Blazers forward around the neck area. The contact was inadvertent, and Green ended up on the hardwood, but Green got called for a foul. After a minute of arguing with both referees, with Kerr shooing Green away from one, the power forward picked up his first technical foul of the year.
It took Green 16 minutes of game time to get hit with a technical. Kerr called timeout to calm things down, and new assistant coach Jerry Stackhouse also got involved in damage control on the bench. Last season, Green picked up 10 technicals and got ejected from four games.
Green stayed in the game and continued to produce. He joined the starters to begin the second half, and the unit looked better than they did off the jump. A pair of 3s from Curry and Wiggins helped the combination expand Golden State’s lead from 12 to 17.
Then the reserves re-entered, coming at the Blazers in waves. The Warriors’ avalanche of 3s and relentless pace wore Portland down. Hield hit a 3 and then leaked out for an and-1 — off Curry’s 10th assist of the game — to put the Warriors up 89-63. Overall, Golden State assisted on 38 of its 48 made field goals.
De’Anthony Melton closed the third with a pair of breakaway dunks off turnovers. He, Hield and Moody each ended up in double figures in the scoring column.
After the choppy first quarter, the Warriors won the middle periods 41-29 and 37-22. Their lead was so comfortable, Curry didn’t even check in for the fourth quarter to collect the last rebound for what would’ve been a triple-double. Moody feasted against the end of Portland’s bench and Lindy Waters III hit a 3 to give the Warriors a 34-point lead.
By then, even if the game was rough, the Warriors were floating.