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NBA: Stephen Curry Leads Golden State Warriors Past Toronto Raptors, Now 12-0

By Dustin Murrell
Published on: 20:54 PST, Nov 17, 2015

The Goldens State Warriors, led by Stephen Curry’s 37 points, gained a hard-fought, 115-110 victory over the Toronto Raptors to remain the only undefeated team in the NBA.

Last year’s NBA Finals MVP had nine assists to go with his game-high 37 points. As noted at NBA.com, Stephen Curry has scored 30+ points in eight of the Warriors’ 12 games this season. His performance Tuesday was par for the course, as Curry performs better against the Raptors than any other team. Stephen was averaging almost 28 points against Toronto before Tuesday’s game, and 8.5 assists on top of that. Stephen Curry’s average stats against the Toronto Raptors will be even more impressive after beating both numbers in the 5-point win.

Golden State’s 12 wins, along with the four games they won to end the 2014-15 regular season, ties the franchise record for most consecutive regular season wins at 16 — a record set during last season’s NBA Championship run. It’s the best start to the NBA regular season since the Dallas Mavericks began the 2002-03 season 14-0.

As the Los Angeles Times details, Klay Thompson and Andrew Bogut were big contributors for the Warriors as well. Despite concerns about his back, Thompson put up 19 points after sitting out of Saturday’s game against the Brooklyn Nets. The decision to sit out of the Nets game was something Thompson admitted he should have done earlier, but it clearly did the trick before this game against the Raptors.

Andrew Bogut had 13 points in his return to the Warriors’ starting line-up at the center position. Slowly returning to the starting position after passing the NBA’s concussion protocol, Bogut came off of the bench for four straight Golden State games. His performance Tuesday shows exactly why Steve Kerr was anxious to get Andrew Bogut back as a starter. Having played 32 minutes against the Nets and scoring 10 points off the bench, it was clear Bogut was well-rested. Festus Ezeli averaged 8.7 points per game while starting in Bogut’s stead.

The Toronto Raptors put up a valiant effort, coming back from being down 18 points to gain a two-point lead in the fourth quarter. As Golden State got things going again, Toronto managed to stay within one as the game was nearing the end. Raptors point guard Kyle Lowry’s offensive foul late in the game — and Stephen Curry’s two resulting free throws — finally put things out of reach for Toronto. Lowry had 28 points for the Raptors, as did shooting guard DeMar DeRozan.

This win puts the Golden State Warriors three games ahead of second place San Antonio in the Western Conference. At 7-5, the Toronto Raptors are in sixth place in the Eastern Conference. If they were in the Western Conference, they’d be in sixth place as well. The major difference is that Toronto is only a game and a half out of first place in the Eastern Conference, whereas the Raptors would be five games behind first in the Western Conference.

This fantastic start to the 2015-16 season for the Golden State Warriors has fans comparing the team to the legendary Chicago Bulls of the 1995-96 season. Debate it all you want, plug statistics and equations into a computer — the only way to “watch” a dream match-up between Stephen Curry and Michael Jordan is via NBA 2K16 in computer simulation mode. Zach Harper of CBS Sports watched the Warriors vs. Bulls play out on his console to a surprising conclusion.

The Golden State Warriors move on from the Toronto Raptors as they travel to Los Angeles to play the Clippers on Thursday. The game begins at 7:30 and airs on TNT.

[Image credit Ezra Shaw / Getty Images]

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