Losing by one point in a game where your coach was ejected after a blatant missed call that should have been two points for the Warriors off a goaltending call gives them every reason to be as incredulously irate as Steve Kerr was with the referees.
Emotions aside, a much larger problem couldn’t be more obvious after the Warriors’ 103-102 loss to the Los Angeles Clippers on Monday night at Intuit Dome.
The Warriors finally flipped the script on their opponent and won the turnover battle seven to 20. They swiped a season-high 18 steals, which is their most in more than four years. They scored 27 points off turnovers while giving away just seven, and their seven turnovers also were a season best.
A loss still followed them back to the visitor’s locker room and onto their short flight back home. Why? Because the team with the greatest shooter of all time can’t shoot.
No team is going to win shooting 38 percent overall (35 of 92) with a 24.4 3-point percentage (10 of 41).
Steph Curry, to his standards, didn’t have the best shooting game. He went 9 of 23 from the field (39.1 percent) and 4 of 15 from 3-point range (26.7 percent), also making all five of his free throws. But his 27 points led all scorers from both teams, and the only reason the Warriors had a chance at the end was because of Curry’s back-to-back threes in the final minute and a half to bring them within one point before he fouled out at the 42.7-second mark for the first time since Dec. 17, 2021.
Even on an off night, Curry still was the only Warrior to make multiple threes. The Warriors lead the NBA in threes per game, but that’s because he’s responsible for 30 percent of them. Accuracy and shot making has been a serious problem for the Warriors this season and must be atop the priority list now that the Feb. 5 NBA trade deadline is less than a month away.
“I thought we played well. We couldn’t hit shots,” Draymond Green told reporters in LA. “We missed a lot of shots. Lot of shots that we normally make, or can make, we missed. But we took care of the ball. We defended without fouling. I thought we did a lot of good things.
“We forced turnovers, we just didn’t capitalize enough. In a game where you force 20 turnovers and have seven turnovers, we should probably have 130, 140 [points]. It’s unfortunate.”
Green responded admirably one game after his latest ejection. As he put his body on the line and kept staying in the game, Green tied his season-high of 12 assists and did so with just one turnover, helping make him a game-high plus-15 in 32 minutes.
He also was one of many Warriors who couldn’t get the ball to go through the net. The Clippers were begging him to shoot, with the Warriors veteran accepting their invitations and leaving without any party favors. Green missed all six of his threes and converted two layups. That’s about how it went for any Warriors outside of Curry and Jimmy Butler.
Those two combined for 51 points, exactly half of the team’s total. The rest of the starting five – Green, Moses Moody and Quinten Post – totaled 15 points on 17.6-percent shooting (5 of 17) and went 1 of 11 beyond the arc. Gary Payton II was the lone Warrior outside of Curry and Butler to score in double figures, finishing with 14 points off the bench on 7-of-10 shooting, making three dunks, two layups and one floater.
Ironically, the hottest shooter of the night was a rookie on a two-way contract the Warriors could have snagged in the second round of last June’s draft. Kobe Sanders scored a career-high 20 points and was more dynamic than any of the Warriors’ young players still trying to prove themselves. The San Diego native made nine of his 16 shot attempts as he showcased the skill that got him drafted in the first place.
Sanders worked out for the Warriors at Chase Center prior to the draft and would have been available for them if they didn’t trade back from 41 to take Alex Toohey two picks after the Clippers added Sanders at No. 50 overall. Toohey didn’t play a single game for the Warriors, or their G League affiliate this season and was waived by Golden State on Dec. 8.
All five Clippers starters scored in double figures. The Warriors attempted 15 more shots than the Clippers but made two fewer than them, too. For more than eight minutes of a 13-point third quarter, the Warriors didn’t make a single shot.
They now rank 27th in field-goal percentage (45.2 percent), 15th in 3-point percentage (36 percent) and 20th in offensive rating (113.6). Starting Jan. 15, Jonathan Kuminga becomes trade eligible. The trade deadline is exactly three weeks later.
Several areas of need stick out. The Warriors still are too small, and an extra ball-handler wouldn’t hurt. Consistently and confidently knowing somebody else outside of Curry and Butler will put points on the scoreboard and be a threat from 3-point distance somehow remains the biggest problem at the start of 2026.
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