Steph Curry leads player-led meeting as Warriors reach tipping point – NBC Sports Bay Area and California

Steph Curry leads player-led meeting as Warriors reach tipping point – NBC Sports Bay Area and California

SAN FRANCISCO — While everyone else was opening Christmas presents and gathering around the tree with family, Steph Curry was busy sending a message to his Warriors teammates before taking on the Los Angeles Lakers at Chase Center on Wednesday.

The message was loud and clear to all ears: This could go one way or the other, so we have to figure it out.

Warriors second-year pro player Trayce Jackson-Davis revealed during the walkthrough that the meeting was player-led and Curry was the loudest. Jackson-Davis completely agrees with everything Curry had to say.

“He’s right,” Jackson-Davis said. “We’re just at the point where you can either let go and drop a few more, or you can get back on the horse and start winning.”

The Warriors won their first two games of the season in overwhelming fashion before losing to the LA Clippers by eight points and then winning four straight games. They started the season 12-3 and looked like a refreshed squad ready to remind the rest of the league that they can still compete for a championship, a few months after a franchise icon became Western champions Conference last season.

Then everything collapsed.

In late November and early December, the Warriors lost five straight games. After Wednesday’s 115-113 loss to the Lakers, they have now lost 11 of their last 14 games, putting them at 15-14 overall and outside of the playoffs.

Andrew Wiggins wouldn’t open the window to the Warriors’ player meeting any further, but as he noted, Curry knows when his voice needs to be heard. Although this didn’t result in a victory hours later, the hope is that it puts the appropriate pressure on a team looking to find its way.

“It’s obviously a turning point in terms of where our season can go,” Curry said. “I think in our last 14 games, whatever it may be, it’s been difficult to find any momentum or consistency and you just can’t lose heart, the belief that we’re a team that is good enough to figure it out” because this league is ruthless. … At the moment we are exactly in the time window in which we can gain some momentum for the next few weeks, no matter how crucial the weeks before the break are.

“Otherwise we’re in a situation where we’re chasing the track and no one wants to be there.”

From training camp in Hawaii to the Warriors’ perfect 6-0 preseason record to their strong start to the regular season and a few blips along the way, players and coaches have maintained high morale.

The group still believes in each other. There is a different atmosphere in the dressing room than last season. Admittedly, there have already been some brutal losses.

And Steve Kerr has not obscured the current state of affairs.

“We’re down,” Kerr admitted. “Everyone is disappointed. We lost a bit of self-confidence, you can feel it. We had a great atmosphere at the start of the season and that’s what we’re experiencing right now. But I love our boys.

“Guys with strong character. They care. They care about the game, they care about each other. I believe in you. I believe we will turn things around. That’s all part of it. It’s part of the season, part of life. You hit these low points and feel like everything is hard and difficult. You have to feel the flow, you have to feel the confidence. We’ll keep going and get it done.”

The incredibly tough schedule the Warriors find themselves in isn’t getting any easier. They have three games left in the calendar year and travel to the LA Clippers on Friday night. This is the first night of back-to-back games as they then take on the Phoenix Suns at Chase Center on Saturday and close out the year against Cleveland Cavaliers at home on Monday.

After playing the Clippers in LA, they also begin a six-game homestand. There are 53 games left in the regular season. Urgency is also preached from the front desk.

“I’m sure everyone has a different answer, but I still have hope, confidence and belief that we can figure it out,” Curry said. “That’s how I’m built, and I feel like you can go out and talk about it, but also how you do it, how you show up every night, how hard we try – even considering how long our record has been In the final stretch, it’s a team desperately trying to figure it out. It just didn’t go according to our expectations.

“Until things change, you have to keep that mentality.”

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