Golden State Warriors star guard Stephen Curry suffered a tailbone contusion at the end of the third quarter of Wednesday night’s 108-94 win against the Rockets in Houston and did not return.
The injury occurred on the final play of the third quarter, after Curry missed an off-balance 3-pointer. His momentum took him off the floor and pushed him toward the risers by the Rockets’ bench. He appeared to trip on the first level of risers and was unable to break his fall.
Warriors coach Steve Kerr called the injury “kind of scary” but said after the game that he doesn’t think Curry will miss much time.
“He says he’s going to be fine long term,” Kerr said. “It’s going to bother him, though, for definitely the next few days. No idea if he’ll play in Memphis [on Friday], but he seems to be feeling like he’ll be OK over the next week or so, but we’ll see … and please don’t take that to mean that I’m saying he’s going to be out for a week. He could be practicing [Thursday] for all I know, but we’ll give you an update as soon as we have one.”
Kerr said Curry did not get X-rays after the game and did not expect him to undergo additional tests.
“I didn’t see it at first, and then after the buzzer sounded, I saw everybody getting up to look at what was happening,” Kerr said. “So it was scary. He told me after that he started backpedaling and normally he would have basically fallen back into the fans sitting courtside, but there’s nobody there, obviously. So he said he sort of took that step expecting to stop and he just kept going and fell right on his tailbone, on that piece of metal on the sidelines that holds the stands in place.”
Curry immediately grabbed his backside in pain and stayed on the floor for a few moments after initially trying to get up. He went straight back to the Warriors’ locker room for examination and was subsequently ruled out.
Warriors forward Draymond Green said he spoke to Curry after the game, and like Kerr, said the star guard thought he was going to fall back into the Rockets’ bench.
“Hopefully it’s not too long,” Green said. “But at the end of the day, the most important thing is his health. When you’re dealing with a tailbone injury, if that’s not right, other things tend to shut down and you start to use other muscles that you shouldn’t be using. Next man up, but other guys got to continue to step up, including myself.”
Curry finished the game 7-for-18 from the field but just 2-for-11 from beyond the arc.
