In the Golden State Warriors’ exciting 113-112 NBA victory over the Phoenix Suns and former teammate Kevin Durant on Saturday, Stephen Curry drained the game-winning three-pointer.
Curry finished with 30 points after making nine three-pointers, but the 35-year-old superstar kept his best for last.
With 3.3 seconds left in a back-and-forth game that saw 22 lead changes, Curry stole an awkward inbounds pass from Brandin Podziemski, pivoted, and drained a deep three-point shot to give Golden State the lead with seven tenths of a second left. The Warriors were down 112-110 at that point.
Curry, a four-time champion and two-time NBA Most Valuable Player with the Warriors, who are fighting this season to stay in the Western Conference, saw it as just another unforgettable event.
With 35.6 seconds remaining in the game, Brandin Podziemski’s turnaround jump shot gave Phoenix a 112-110 lead. Booker finished with 32 points to lead the Suns. Durant scored another 24, but he was unable to get a shot off on the Suns’ final-second inbounds play.
In another game, the Dallas Mavericks defeated the highly skilled Oklahoma City Thunder 146-111, matching their longest winning streak of the NBA season with a fourth straight victory led by 32 points from Luka Doncic and 25 from Kyrie Irving.
Along with P.J. Washington, who was also acquired at the trade deadline, Daniel Gafford made his Mavs debut, scoring 19 points and pulling down nine rebounds.
In the first quarter, Doncic assisted both rookies on alley-oop dunks as Dallas jumped out to a 47-30 lead.
The two best scorers in the league, Doncic and Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, both Canadians, were superior. NBA scoring leader Nikola Jokić added eight rebounds and nine assists while getting a quarter of rest.
Gilgeous-Alexander led the Thunder, who entered the game only a half-game behind Minnesota for the Western Conference lead, by as much as 41 points and lost their second straight game despite Gilgeous-Alexander’s 25 points, six rebounds, and five assists.
In the second quarter, Irving recorded his 4,000th assist of the game with eight more.
Gafford and Washington get along well with their new colleagues, which is exactly what Dallas needs as they want to move up from ninth place in the West, as Mavs coach Jason Kidd was happy to witness.
“I thought Gafford was great on both ends,” Kidd stated. “P.J. seemed to just intuitively grasp the game. We didn’t have to run anybody’s minutes up because the pace was fast.
The Los Angeles Clippers, who defeated the Detroit Pistons, who were the weakest team in the league, 112-106, moved into second place in the Western Conference while the Thunder struggled.
The Clippers overcame a 13-point hole early in the third quarter, with Paul George scoring 15 of his 33 points in the fourth quarter.
The Clippers, who had taken an early 12-2 lead in front of their home crowd, saw the Pistons respond with 24 points from Kawhi Leonard.
