SAN FRANCISCO – Steph Curry will miss Wednesday night’s marquee matchup against the Oklahoma City Thunder at Chase Center, but coach Steve Kerr expects the Warriors superstar back in the very near future. As in the Warriors’ next game when they take on the Suns in Phoenix on Saturday night.
Curry did not partake in the Warriors’ intense practice Tuesday after dropping two consecutive games where they held large leads. He popped up on the Warriors’ injury report with bilateral patellofemoral pain, which essentially is soreness in both of his knees, and officially was ruled out on Wednesday’s 12:30 p.m. PT injury report.
Kerr said he found out Wednesday morning that Curry wouldn’t be able to play against OKC, but his injury isn’t anything new.
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“He’s been banged up the last week,” Kerr said Wednesday during his pregame press conference. “His knees have been bothering him, so this wasn’t a surprise.”
Warriors director of sports medicine and performance Rick Celebrini called Kerr on Wednesday morning to recommend not playing Curry, and the coach agreed.
In the Warriors’ 128-120 loss to the Brooklyn Nets on Monday night, Curry scored a team-high 28 points, but 16 of his 17 shot attempts were 3-pointers. He also played under 30 minutes for the seventh time this season, or half the games he has played.
The 36-year-old is averaging only 29.7 minutes per game this season, which would be his lowest for a full season. Curry averaged 27.8 minutes when he played just five games in the 2019-20 season, and 28.2 minutes in his injury-shortened third season in the NBA.
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That’s the reality of Father Time, wear and tear for a four-time champion coming off a summer of winning gold at the 2024 Paris Summer Olympics.
“At 36, you’re just going to have more aches and pains,” Kerr said. “Fortunately the MRI that he had yesterday was negative, but he needs some time to clear the tendinitis that’s in his knees right now and hopefully the next couple of days will do that.”
Golden State enters its battle with Oklahoma City as the No. 2 seed in the Western Conference. The Thunder are one game ahead atop the conference. And the Warriors are going against perhaps the hardest schedule in the entire league to close out the calendar year .
But the Warriors are 3-0 this season without Curry when he missed three games to an ankle injury, after going 3-5 a season ago in games they didn’t have him. Kerr says he learned in that stretch earlier this season how the Warriors can lean on their depth, adding he’s excited for several players to have to step up against such stiff competition.
Though Kerr didn’t announce his starters, Brandin Podziemski is expected to have a big role in Curry’s absence. Podziemski has struggled shooting in his second pro season, an area the Warriors will need to show up whenever Curry can’t go. However, in the three games Curry missed, Podziemski averaged 14.7 points, 5.3 rebounds and 6.0 assists while playing 36.5 minutes per game -- but also shooting a lowly 40.9 percent overall and 27.8 percent from 3-point range.
The Warriors this season have a 121.7 offensive rating with Curry on the court. That number drops to 106.6 when the Warriors are without him, a stat that certainly is concerning when playing the Thunder’s top-ranked defense.
The positive news is the Warriors should be getting a much-needed addition against the Thunder. Jonathan Kuminga missed the Warriors’ previous two games to an illness, but he practiced Tuesday and Kerr expects him to play Wednesday night.
Kuminga in the Warriors’ win over the Thunder on Nov. 10 scored 20 points on 8-of-11 shooting in 26-plus minutes off the bench.