<\/p>\n
Golden State Warriors guard Stephen Curry, who last played on Jan. 30, shoots during practice at Chase Center in San Francisco on Saturday. He is expected to be in the lineup Sunday for a game against the Rockets.<\/p>\n
Benjamin Fanjoy\/For the S.F. Chronicle<\/p>\n
Golden State Warriors guard Stephen Curry practices at Chase Center in San Francisco on Saturday. The team\u2019s leading scorer at 27.2 points per game, he has been sidelined because of a knee issue since Jan. 30.<\/p>\n
Benjamin Fanjoy\/For the S.F. Chronicle<\/p>\n
Golden State Warriors guard Stephen Curry shoots during practice at Chase Center in San Francisco on Saturday.<\/p>\n
Benjamin Fanjoy\/For the S.F. Chronicle<\/p>\n
Golden State Warriors guard Stephen Curry takes a break during practice at Chase Center in San Francisco on Saturday.<\/p>\n
Benjamin Fanjoy\/For the S.F. Chronicle<\/p>\n
The wait is over. Steph is back.<\/p>\n
Golden State Warriors<\/a> head coach Steve\u00a0Kerr<\/a> announced Saturday that Stephen Curry<\/a> is expected to return from a months-long absence for an Easter Sunday home game against the Rockets: \u201cThe plan is for him to play,\u201d Kerr said. Anxiety over Curry\u2019s return has bubbled for a while. Will he? Won\u2019t he? Why should he?\u00a0<\/p>\n Curry looks ready to scratch that basketball itch, is why. Saturday before his spurt of individual shooting drills, he crinkled a smile, laughed loudly, and bunched the No. 30 practice jersey over his face. The exact cause was unclear. But a weight appeared to lift. A lightness could be found where the heaviness of a losing season long resided, sans a healthy Curry.<\/p>\n Article continues below this ad<\/p>\n Well before his team was guaranteed a regular-season record at or under .500, he planned to be back in a week. Ten days, tops, he said.\u00a0Then the so-called \u201crunner\u2019s knee\u201d slowly revealed itself.<\/p>\n Frustration piled, and his timetable lengthened.<\/p>\n San Francisco Chronicle Logo<\/p>\n Make us a Preferred Source to get more of our news when you search.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Add Preferred Source<\/p>\n <\/a><\/p>\n \u201cEvery time I got on the court or tried to push it that first month, there was always, I call it a reaction,\u201d Curry said.<\/p>\n \u201cThe patience then was tough just because it\u2019s one of those injuries that you really just have to let rest. There\u2019s nothing you can kind of push through. \u2026 It\u2019s a different experience than most injuries that I\u2019ve had.\u201d<\/p>\n Article continues below this ad<\/p>\n Golden State Warriors guard Stephen Curry discusses his intention to return to the court Sunday for a game against the Rockets during a press conference at Chase Center on Saturday.<\/p>\n Benjamin Fanjoy\/For the S.F. Chronicle<\/p>\n Curry last played on Jan. 30, and has missed 27 straight games since then. He participated in a pair of 5-on-5 scrimmages within a span of three days as part of this past week\u2019s ramp-up.<\/p>\n He said his knee feels good. Hopefully, he said, it will stay that way when he wakes up Sunday. That\u2019s how tenuous his rehab process has been.<\/p>\n Asked whether his ambiguous right knee injury may yet linger, Curry, 38, cited a \u201cnew normal\u201d he needed to accept: \u201cThere\u2019s nothing structurally wrong with my knee, so it\u2019s not like I\u2019m compromised out there. It is a new normal, though, if that makes sense. \u2026 I will take full advantage of the offseason, whenever it is, to have a full reset. And then you just kind of figure out what it looks like going into next year. But right now, I kind of understand what the new normal is, and it\u2019s good enough to play.\u201d<\/p>\n Article continues below this ad<\/p>\n At minimum, ruminations of a potential shutdown shall cease. Kerr, who dodged other questions, including one inquiring about a minutes restriction, shot straight about why Curry will play again in what has increasingly appeared as a lost season.<\/p>\n \u201cWe owe it to our fans to get them the opportunity to watch\u00a0Steph Curry play basketball this year,\u201d Kerr said. \u201cAnd Steph doesn\u2019t even think twice about that. That\u2019s what he wants. That\u2019s what we want. That\u2019s what our fans want. That\u2019s what we\u2019re going to do.\u201d<\/p>\n Saddled with a 36-41 season to date, the Warriors have five games left until the NBA play-in tournament, for which they have clinched a spot. \u201cI was telling him, I don\u2019t know how people are going to guard our pick-and-roll,\u201d Curry said.<\/p>\n \u201cAnytime you have talent like that and two guys that can demand attention, it\u2019s always a good thing, to create good offense and help elevate whoever we\u2019re out there with.\u201d<\/p>\n Article continues below this ad<\/p>\n Even with Curry ready to rejoin his teammates, he acknowledged the weirdness of the Warriors\u2019 standing as the 10th seed in the Western Conference.\u00a0 Gary\u00a0Payton II put it simply: \u201cNow, Superman\u2019s back,\u201d Payton said, \u201cso we\u2019ll figure it out with that.\u201d<\/p>\n Golden State has struggled to piece things together in Curry\u2019s absence, managing just a 13-25 record playing without him this season. His absence was felt more deeply because of other injuries. The big ones: Jimmy Butler was ruled out for the season in January with a torn ACL and Moses Moody tore his left patellar tendon last month.<\/p>\n But maybe No. 30 heals all: \u201cHope, he just brings hope to everybody,\u201d Kerr said. \u201cThe sun is shining a little brighter. The food tastes a little better. Steph is Steph.\u201d<\/p>\n Article continues below this ad<\/p>\n Briefly: Veteran center Al Horford (calf), after a recent evaluation, has advanced in his on-court workouts and participated in a portion of Saturday\u2019s team practice.\u00a0Horford has missed 11 consecutive games. He will be evaluated again this coming week; the same goes for reserve center Quinten Post (foot), who was evaluated on Saturday.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Golden State Warriors guard Stephen Curry, who last played on Jan. 30, shoots during practice at Chase Center…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":252425,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30],"tags":[7000,101,103,102,104,106,105,127,14843,13340],"class_list":{"0":"post-252424","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-san-francisco","8":"tag-golden-state-warriors","9":"tag-san-francisco","10":"tag-san-francisco-headlines","11":"tag-san-francisco-news","12":"tag-sf","13":"tag-sf-headlines","14":"tag-sf-news","15":"tag-sports","16":"tag-stephen-curry","17":"tag-warriors"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/252424","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=252424"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/252424\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/252425"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=252424"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=252424"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=252424"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}<\/p>\n
<\/a>
<\/a><\/p>\n
Curry changes the way the sport is played whenever he steps on the floor. What that could look like with him playing next to 7-foot-2 stretch big Kristaps Porzingis, acquired via the Jonathan Kuminga trade, has folks in Chase Center on their toes. Curry especially.\u00a0
Porzingis joined the Warriors on Feb. 5 when Curry already was out of commission.<\/p>\n
Winning their last five games of the regular season wouldn\u2019t change much. The ninth seed is the highest Golden State can get, meaning the\u00a0Warriors will have to win two play-in games to make the playoffs, no matter what. This team\u2019s ceiling is hard to calibrate.<\/p>\n