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Stephen Curry #30 of the Golden State Warriors closes his eyes between plays in the third quarter against the Chicago Bulls.
Steve Kerr only had less than one game to enjoy the full complement of the Golden State Warriors roster.
Superstar Stephen Curry, who rolled his right ankle with 3:51 to play during Thursday’s 125-122 loss to the Chicago Bulls has already been officially ruled out for Saturday, March 9, home game against the San Antonio Spurs. But the good news is he will not be out for long.
“The good news was the MRI was basically fine,” Kerr said on the “Willard and Dibs” on 95.7 The Game on Friday night, March 8. “But an injury like this takes a couple of days to really evaluate.”
According to ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski, “The expectation is that Curry won’t miss much time for the Warriors, sources said. ”
Rookie center Trayce Jackson-Davis was also listed as questionable against the Spurs, who will also be missed No. 1 pick Victor Wembanyama. Both big men, like Curry, have sustained right ankle sprain.
With Curry out, Chris Paul is likely to take his place in the starting lineup.
“We know he is more than capable. He’s Chris Paul,” Draymond Green said, per ESPN. “It’s been incredible having C here, but then you have Steph going down — no one is Steph Curry in the NBA. But knowing you are going into the game with a guy who can win you game after game after game, it definitely gives you confidence going in knowing that you are more than capable to win games.”
In 11 starts for the Warriors this season, Paul averaged 12.7 points, 7.5 assists and 3.8 rebounds. But they have lost seven of those games.
Meanwhile, if Jackson-Davis will also sit out, Kevon Looney will return to the rotation after his league’s second-longest streak of 290 games played ended on Thursday.
Warriors Teammates Rally Around Steph Curry
Klay Thompson, who fired 25 points off the bench, hopes Curry can return sooner for the Warriors’ stretch run.
“I know we’re going to miss him if he does need time off,” Thompson told reporters after Thursday’s loss. “We’ve been in this position before where he has had time off, and we just got to do it collectively. I know he’ll be ready to go when he does come back, whenever that is. We just wish him a speedy recovery.”
“It sucks, but everybody deals with injuries,” Green said, per ESPN. “You’ve just got to do the best you can in dealing with it.”
The Warriors are 0-3 this season without Curry.
Andrew Wiggins’ Minutes to Increase
Andrew Wiggins started anew in his second game back from a four-game absence due to personal reasons but remained on a minute restriction against the Bulls.
After Wiggins shot the ball much better this time around and was a plus-7 in 16 minutes of play, Kerr indicated that his playing time will gradually increase after averaging 14.5 minutes in his first two games since his four-game absence due to personal reasons.
“He missed eight or 10 days and wasn’t really ready to go long minutes and so we wanted, with the back to back, we purposely kept his minutes down to help him kind of get back in the groove and I would expect to his minutes to go back up from here on,” Kerr said on the “Willard and Dibs” on 95.7 The Game.
Wiggins finished with eight points on 3 of 6 shooting against the Bulls after only hitting 1 of 5 against the Milwaukee Bucks on Wednesday, March 6. He added two assists, one rebound and one steal.
Alder Almo is a basketball journalist covering the New York Knicks, Los Angeles Lakers and Golden State Warriors for Heavy. He has more than 15 years of experience in local and international media, including broadcast, print and digital. He previously covered the Knicks for Empire Sports Media and the NBA for Off the Glass. Alder is from the Philippines and is now based in Jersey City, New Jersey. More about Alder Almo
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