SAN FRANCISCO — Canon Curry, perhaps better than anyone, understood what the Warriors’ loss in Game 6 meant.
The 6-year-old son of the Warriors’ superstar guard just wanted to cry after the Warriors’ embarrassing 115-107 loss to the Rockets on Friday night, which forced a Game 7 in Houston.
Can you blame him?
Papa Curry tried to comfort his son: “Guess what? We’ve got another game on Sunday … It’s OK.”
But the Warriors are already one of 13 teams in NBA history to blow a 3-1 playoff series lead, having lost to the Cleveland Cavaliers in the 2016 NBA Finals.
Now, they’re positioned for the heartbreak again on Sunday night.
So is it really OK, Steph?
Golden State Warriors’ Stephen Curry (30) chats with his son Canon after Game 6 of the Western Conference First Round NBA Playoffs game at Chase Center in San Francisco, Calif., on Friday, May 2, 2025. The Houston Rockets defeated the Golden State Warriors 115-107. (Jose Carlos Fajardo/Bay Area News Group)Related Articles
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The Warriors are scared. They should be.
“We got Game 7,” Warriors coach Steve Kerr said in a near monotone Friday night. “We’re excited about that … We feel like we got a great chance to go down there and win.”
Jimmy Butler even suggested that the Warriors’ confidence was at an “all-time high.”
Did anyone tell him the final score of the game?
Confidence has betrayed the Warriors in the series. After Golden State won Game 4 at Chase Center, they celebrated as if the series was over. They treated Game 5 in Houston — a close-out game — like a preseason affair, looking for any good reason to put their best players on the bench to rest. They figured they’d come home and close out the Rockets Friday.
Then they didn’t.
And the Warriors can’t even delude themselves into believing that they deserved a win — Houston was far and away the better team in Game 6, turning a 20-5 run in the first eight minutes of the fourth quarter to pull away in what was, going into the final frame, a two-point game.
Golden State Warriors’ Draymond Green (23) and Houston Rockets’ Alperen Sengun (28) end up on their backs in the 1st quarter of Game 6 of the Western Conference First Round NBA Playoffs game at Chase Center in San Francisco, Calif., on Friday, May 2, 2025. (Karl Mondon/Bay Area News Group)What’s left in the tank for Game 7?
These guys are gassed. Another flight to Houston and a rock-fight game against the league’s premier brawlers is the last thing they need.
Butler’s bruised glute (yes, that’s the injury) has zapped him of his explosion on the perimeter. Curry has been pushed, prodded and punched so often that he’s taking breathers on the floor after fouls.
The Warriors missed 14 of their first 15 shots in the fourth quarter Friday. Curry and Butler both went 0-for-5 during that stretch.
Meanwhile, Green is back in the 2022 NBA Finals, where he was borderline unplayable, and Kerr is desperately trying to find a role player — any role player — who can turn in a good game against one of the NBA’s best defenses and their new go-to, double-big zone scheme.
No one with the Warriors wanted to say they were tired, but when pressed, they seemed too tired to flatly deny it.
“It can be due to whatever,” Green said. “In order to beat this team, you got to make second and third efforts. Last two games, we have not done that.”
Is it a coincidence that the Warriors’ last two games have coincided with the series moving to an every-other-day schedule?
I don’t think so.
The younger Rockets have taken full advantage of this series’ wear-and-tear. And for the Warriors, who were once thinking title, it’s now another flight, another game — a bit more attrition in this war that we call the playoffs.
“This is a grind. This is tough. This is what it’s supposed to be in the playoffs, bring the best out of you,” Curry said. “You earn the right to get to the next round.”
And while a win on Sunday would certainly beat the alternative, what lessons have the Warriors taken from this first-round series that can serve them well should they advance?
Every team the Warriors face this postseason will be younger. The schedule — both in frequency of games and distance traveled — won’t become any easier. Is a flight to Minneapolis that much better than a flight to Houston?
Houston Rockets’ Alperen Sengun (28) fouls Golden State Warriors’ Jimmy Butler III (10) in the fourth quarter of Game 6 of the Western Conference First Round NBA Playoffs game at Chase Center in San Francisco, Calif., on Friday, May 2, 2025. Sengun would be charged with a flagrant foul on this play. The Houston Rockets defeated the Golden State Warriors 115-107. (Jose Carlos Fajardo/Bay Area News Group)Related Articles
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The team’s inability to hold onto an actual playoff spot in the final week of the season was certainly inauspicious. Their failure to close out this series without needing a Game 7 tells us even more.
In a one-game series, like we now have, it’s impossible to bet against the Warriors and Curry. We’ve seen him do too many roundball miracles to expect anything less come Sunday.
But this might be a classic case of winning the battle but losing the war.
My favorite trope that apologists trot out in a circumstance like this is the suggestion that at past points in history — before the season, mid-season, and before this series — the Warriors would have gladly accepted a Game 7.
And that’s absolutely true. Who wouldn’t have been thrilled for a Game 7 against the Rockets when this Warriors team was middling at best mid-season?
I suggested the Warriors would win this series in seven games at the start of it.
But, here’s the thing: context matters. And in that apologist hypothetical, they left out the fact that the Warriors had a 3-1 series lead.
When you know that, Game 7 takes on a much different meaning.
And when you fully consider the ramifications of Sunday’s game — either the end of a season or the continuation of a slow march to a seemingly inevitable loss …
Well, it’s enough to make you cry.
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