{"id":955018,"date":"2026-11-06T18:30:14","date_gmt":"2026-11-06T18:30:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/955018\/"},"modified":"2026-11-06T18:30:14","modified_gmt":"2026-11-06T18:30:14","slug":"warriors-arent-steph-currys-one-man-show-anymore-that-changes-everything","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/955018\/","title":{"rendered":"Warriors aren’t Steph Curry’s one-man show anymore. That changes everything"},"content":{"rendered":"

SAN FRANCISCO \u2014 The Golden State Warriors<\/a> don\u2019t look like a playoff team<\/a> because Stephen Curry is defying<\/a> Father Time and playing a vintage, MVP-level season.<\/p>\n

No, they look like a playoff team because they aren\u2019t dying when he sits.<\/p>\n

For the better part of this decade, Golden State\u2019s minutes without Curry have resembled a burning trash barge shoved out to sea. You held your breath, prayed any lead wouldn\u2019t evaporate before the six-minute mark of the fourth quarter, and waited for No. 30 to peel off his wraps and save them.<\/p>\n

Not anymore. Not with this roster.<\/p>\n

Thursday night\u2019s 120-100 demolition of the Miami Heat wasn\u2019t notable because Steph dropped 22 points in the second half to finish off another signature blitz. It was notable because nine Warriors of an 11-man rotation scored eight or more points.<\/p>\n

Nine.<\/p>\n

When you get that kind of across-the-board play, everything changes. It turns a lackluster 0-3 start into a six-game heater. It turns a team destined for play-in purgatory into an outfit capable of skipping a play-in tournament altogether.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s early days yet, but this team looks\u2026 competent.<\/p>\n

All because they\u2019re not totally lost without Curry on the floor.<\/p>\n

To understand how radical this shift is, consider this:<\/p>\n

In the last three seasons combined, Curry has only played 133 minutes more than he\u2019s sat.<\/p>\n

Yet the Warriors have scored 1,825 more points in those minutes than he\u2019s been on the court. That\u2019s 13 points of difference for every minute played.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s absurd.<\/p>\n

Even in the Warriors\u2019 most recent championship year, surviving without Steph was a high-wire act.<\/p>\n

Now? Well, apparently it\u2019s where games get put to bed.<\/p>\n

Night night.<\/p>\n

Take Thursday night\u2019s fourth quarter against Miami, for example. Curry checked out of the game with roughly 7 minutes remaining. The Warriors were up 17, and things were looking good. But when the Heat cut it to 12 two minutes later, the Chase Center crowd got quiet, and Steve Kerr still had Curry on the bench.<\/p>\n

He never had to check back in.<\/p>\n

Instead, a lineup featuring Brandin Podziemski, rookie Yaxel Lendeborg, Charles Bassey, Georges Niang and Brandon Williams \u2014 a real who\u2019s who \u2014 torched Miami across a decisive three-minute stretch upon Niang\u2019s entry with 4:22 to play.<\/p>\n

Podziemski is no longer just a high-energy scrapper. He\u2019s playing with veteran poise, directing traffic and keeping possessions fluid without gumming up the gears.<\/p>\n

Lendeborg has been a game-changer, a season-changer, and a franchise-changer. The rookie is a near-guarantee for at least 15, 5, and 5 nightly, handling creation and shot-making duties on the second unit like he\u2019s in Year 6, not Game 9. It isn\u2019t always perfect, but his less-than-stellar is still additive for the Dubs.<\/p>\n

And don\u2019t sleep on Will Richard, who didn\u2019t close but stepped into the starting lineup on Thursday and delivered the exact kind of two-way discipline and spacing that lineup craved. He doesn\u2019t need plays drawn up for him; he just makes the right cut, rotates on a string and hits open looks.<\/p>\n

Finally, we need to talk about Charles \u201cBasketball\u201d Bassey, a man worthy of such a lofty nickname.<\/p>\n

I questioned why the front office didn\u2019t lock him up the second last season ended. He brings vertical pop, rim protection and relentless downhill energy. And it\u2019s not like he cost much.<\/p>\n

He\u2019s athletic Kevon Looney. There\u2019s no higher compliment you can receive in this space.<\/p>\n

But all\u2019s well that ends well, and Bassey is standing out as the Warriors\u2019 top center in recent games.<\/p>\n

Miami had zero answers for any Warrior on Thursday. After their early game adrenaline wore off and Draymond Green started locking down the paint, the Heat looked sluggish and disjointed, caught in a spacing nightmare between Giannis Antetokounmpo and Bam Adebayo that made their offense look like a bad \u201990s flashback.<\/p>\n

Golden State exposed them because Golden State actually has 10-plus guys who know who they are and how they can contribute to winning. The Heat can\u2019t find one working combination. The Warriors have half a dozen.<\/p>\n

Tests are looming. A matchup against Houston next week will show whether this depth translates against the league\u2019s elite.<\/p>\n

Until then, the reality is simple: Steph is still the engine, but he\u2019s no longer pushing the car uphill by himself. There\u2019s a long way to go yet, but there are reasons to believe that these surging Warriors are for real.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"SAN FRANCISCO \u2014 The Golden State Warriors don\u2019t look like a playoff team because Stephen Curry is defying…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":955019,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[557],"tags":[64,63,56495,485,5552,56492,3914,590,85085,6113,85086,85,2136,85084],"class_list":["post-955018","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nba","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-bay-area","tag-california","tag-golden-state-warriors","tag-inside-sports","tag-latest-headlines","tag-nba","tag-peninsula","tag-san-francisco","tag-san-francisco-county","tag-sports","tag-sports-columnists","tag-warriors-hq"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/955018","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=955018"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/955018\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/955019"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=955018"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=955018"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=955018"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}