A grim sight during Monday night’s 117-110 Warriors loss to the Timberwolves, Steph Curry in street clothes, got far more bleak after the game as Steph Curry looks unlikely to return from his hamstring injury for Game 5 as previously hoped.
Curry, who is dealing with the first soft tissue injury of his career, said he does not expect to return as the Warriors are down 3-1 in the best-of-seven series.
“Even if I wanted to be Superman, I couldn’t,” Curry told Andscape.
Curry had previously said he would be out for a week with a Grade 1 hamstring strain, but now, seven days later, he’s ruling himself out ahead of Wednesday’s Game 5.
Golden State could sure use a superhero-like performance as they’ve faltered in back-to-back games in the second half.
The Warriors were outscored by seven points in the second half of Game 3 and nine points in Game 4 as they badly missed their star guard.
It is unclear when Curry will return if the Warriors can extend this series, but they’ve undoubtedly missed him.
After dropping Game 4, Warriors veteran Draymond Green threw cold water on Curry’s return.
“No, we’re not going to ‘Superman’ this thing,” Green said after the game when asked if he expects Curry to try to push to come back. “If he’s in a place where he can play, I’m sure he will. Him and Rick [Celebrini, Warriors vice president of player health and performance] and everybody will figure that out. But we don’t need [Curry to try to be] Superman.”
Without Curry, the Warriors look to be sitting ducks, especially if their second best player, Jimmy Butler, is unable to keep them afloat.
Butler, who ended Game 4 with just 14 points on 5-for-9 shooting, was called out to lead by coach Steve Kerr.
“He wasn’t as aggressive tonight,” Kerr said. “But I didn’t see a lot of openings, either. Ideally, we could put more shooting around him to open up the floor a little bit. But with Steph out, we’re not going to be able to do as much of that.”
Curry had been averaging 22.6 points per game in the playoffs, shooting 47.7 percent from the field and 40 percent from beyond the arc.
