Day: May 8, 2025

Stephen Curry described his Grade 1 left hamstring strain as a “gut punch.” Curry is out through at least Game 4 of the Western Conference semifinals and will be reevaluated after that.

“This is new, and from all that I’m learning about how quickly you can get back, there has to be a healing process,” Curry said at Golden State Warriors shootaround Thursday before Game 2. “You can’t accelerate it more than what it’s telling you. So it’ll be one of those, after a week, really reevaluating every day to understand when it’s safe just to even think about playing, let alone how much can you push it.”

Curry said he is “a little ways away from” taking stationary jump shots. He said the rehab process right now is “a lot.” Curry felt no warning signs leading to the injury in Game 1.

“I felt great the whole game up until that point,” Curry said. “And then I made a little pivot move on defense and felt something, didn’t think it was nothing or anything. I felt like I could just go get it released and be able to come back out. But with soft tissue, stuff like that, it was one of those situations I could have done more damage if I tried to go back out. So obviously a tough break, but hopefully I’ll be back soon.”

The Boston Celtics have lost both Games 1 and 2 at home to the New York Knicks after blowing 20-point leads in each. The Celtics were 4-0 against the Knicks during the regular season and were a popular pick to comfortably beat New York in the series to advance to the Eastern Conference Finals. Now, the Celtics will need to win four out of five games and are flummoxed that they’re not up 2-0.

“They’re having difficulty coming to terms with what it is happening,” said Brian Windhorst on Get Up in describing the vibes in the Celtics’ locker room after falling down 0-2. “They don’t understand why they’re losing. They believe their process is working. They believe they’re generating good shots. They are doing the recipe that delivered them the championship and 61 wins. And they are not getting the bake out of the oven like they are used to.

“Obviously, there’s variance with shooting this doesn’t make sense to them. They feel like they’re doing a good job on Jalen Brunson. He’s only shooting 35 percent in the series. They want Mikal Bridges taking all those contested jumpers as he made in the fourth quarter. He’s shooting 29 percent in the series, but they’re losing. They’re at a little bit of a loss right now.