SAN FRANCISCO – A stunned and silent crowd with a hurt Jimmy Butler on the hardwood told the real story of the Warriors’ game Monday night against the Miami Heat.
What began with cheers for Andrew Wiggins in his return to Chase Center turned to angst for Butler in an eventual 135-112 Warriors win.
Butler could not put any weight on his right leg once he was up with the help of multiple teammates. The Warriors, minutes later, ruled Butler out with a right knee injury. He already has sustained two injuries to the same knee in the past: A meniscus tear in 2018 and a sprained MCL in 2024.
Shortly after the win, the Warriors said Butler was undergoing an MRI and would provide an update on Tuesday.
Steph Curry, on the same day he was named to his 12th NBA All-Star Game and 11th as a starter, scored 19 points with 11 assists and five 3-pointers.
Brandin Podziemski continued his recent surge and was the game’s leading scorer. The third-year pro scored a season-high 24 points off the bench on 9-of-19 shooting, plus he also added six rebounds and four assists. He was one of seven Warriors to score in double figures.
Wiggins scored 18 points, all in the first half, and was given plenty of love from Golden State.
Here are three takeaways from the Warriors’ first four-game win streak of the season, improving their record to 25-19.
Welcome Back, Wiggins
It was only right that Wiggins scored Miami’s first two points in his first game back at Chase Center as a member of the Heat.
Steve Kerr, during his pregame press conference, reiterated the Warriors wouldn’t have won the 2022 championship without Wiggins. His former coaches and teammates dapped him up while warming up, and Wiggins’ smile stretched ear to ear after the Warriors’ tribute video for him. And then, it was game time.
Wiggins, in the first quarter, got going early with 11 points and four rebounds. Through the Heat’s first nine games since the calendar flipped to 2026, Wiggins was averaging 13.6 points per game. Yet he had already scored 18 against the Warriors in the first half.
However, the former Warrior and forever fan-favorite was held scoreless in the second half. Wiggins still finished as the Heat’s second-leading scorer behind Norman Powell’s 21 points.
Scary Scene
As Wiggins received an abundance of love, Butler was a man on a mission against his old team in his first game against them in the Bay. The two were the best players on the floor to begin the game. Butler scored two more points than Wiggins in the first quarter, 13 to 11, and both were a plus-5. Who were the game’s two leading scorers in the first half?
Of course, the answer to that question is Wiggins (18) and Butler (15). But then the home crowd went completely silent as players huddled around Butler, with him holding his right knee on the ground in the third quarter.
Butler attempted to catch a pass in the paint and landed awkwardly before immediately falling to the floor. He screamed in pain and could not put any weight on his right leg while teammates brought him down the tunnel and back to the Warriors’ locker room.
In 21 minutes, Butler was a plus-9 with 17 points on 6-of-11 shooting and had three rebounds, four assists and two steals.
Mo Money
The Warriors have a pretty solid idea of what they’re going to get out of Curry, Butler and Draymond Green on any given night. The question marks are the two who join them in the starting five when the Warriors are at full strength. For more than a month, those two have been Quinten Post and Moses Moody.
Post put together a strong performance of 15 points, nine rebounds and four 3-pointers. This section is all about Moody’s contributions, though, especially from 3-point range.
Moody, in the Warriors’ first six games of 2026, was shooting 29.2 percent (7 of 24) as a 3-point shooter. The Warriors went 3-3 in those games. From Dec. 14, the first game Moody joined the other four in the starting five, to Jan. 11, he was shooting just 30.6 percent (19 of 62) from three as the Warriors went 8-6. Those numbers have taken a drastic turn in the last four games.
Coincidence or not, the Warriors have their first four-game win streak at the same time Moody has made multiple threes in four straight games for the first time this season. Moody now has made four, seven, four and three 3-pointers for a total of 18 in the Warriors’ last four games. He has gone 18 of 29 in that stretch, good for a 62.1 percent clip. The long ball for the fifth-year wing is an absolute game-changer as an extra scorer for the Warriors.