How Stephen Curry’s 43 points led Warriors to Game 4 win in Boston to tie the NBA Finals (2024)

Follow our live Celtics vs Warriors score and game coverage.

Steph Curry dominated Game 4 with 43 points against the Celtics to tie the series, marking the 27th consecutive playoff series the Warriors have won a road game. Game 5 will be played Monday night in San Francisco. Follow our live coverage here.

Final: Warriors 107, Celtics 97

Box score

(Photo: Paul Rutherford / USA Today)

BOSTON — Sooooo … Are we having fun yet?

After a 43-point masterpiece by Steph Curry that evened the NBA Finals at two games apiece, we’re getting exactly the barnburner of a finals we hoped for. Through four games, we’re not only even on games but have a composite score that separates these sides by one measly point, 422-421.

And yet, it hasn’t felt that way for much of the series. With winners alternating each game, we’ve left the arena every time convinced the evening’s victor had taken control of the series. It turns out this is a bit like “taking control” of a bucking bronco. The series is just gonna go where it wants to go; each winner has lost the next game by double figures.

(Photo: David Butler II / USA Today)

BOSTON — It was a routine step-back 3-pointer, albeit his second in a row. It gave the Warriors a five-point lead. It came with 2:03 left in the first quarter. Nothing about this sequence, and when it occurred, suggested it was of special significance.

Still, after watching his swish, and after the Celtics called a timeout, Curry had something to say. He walked away from the Warriors’ bench, all the way to the other end of the court. Yelling. Flexing. Taunting. On the baseline near the Boston bench, he roared into the sea of green and white, as if he wanted to tremble their souls. They say a tiger’s roar is strong enough to paralyze its prey. Curry usually saves his demonstrative displays for the big moments, when the opponent is vanquished. But this night, in the early stages of this must-win game for the Warriors, Curry wasn’t celebrating a conquest. He was prepping it.

He pointed to the hallowed hardwood beneath his feet and declared the reality the Celtics are facing. They would have to deal with an all-time great this night. All night.

“He wasn’t letting us lose,” Draymond Green said.

(Photo: Kyle Terada / USA Today)

The refrain has been the same for Boston over the past month, a privilege earned by this team performing brilliantly when there is literally no other option, when a loss means the season is over. The champs and Giannis Antetokounmpo and the longtime nemesis Heat with Jimmy Butler, those are two pretty impressive pelts on the Celtics’ wall. They’ve beaten the best the East has to offer in Game 7s at home or on the road.

This pattern of flying into the sun could burn them yet. The Celtics may have younger, taller, quicker defenders than the Warriors, and they may have two bruising, scoring wings, switchable bigs and the reigning NBA Defensive Player of the Year as the point guard. But Golden State is without question the most experienced, championship-hardened, decorated team that exists in today’s NBA. The Celtics’ pattern of playing well early in series, then fumbling away these fantastic opportunities is what makes them plucky and lovable. But they’re now in real danger of losing a series they could have or should have had firmly in their grip when they boarded that plane back to the West Coast.

(Photo: Kyle Terada / USA Today)

BOSTON — Game 4 of an NBA Finals is, often, the championship series’ fulcrum. The path to ultimate victory starts to become clear, with the players necessary to achieve it, and in what combination they’ll play, coming into focus.

But, man, do you have to have mutual trust.

A hundred games, eight months together, and often, a coach has to make a big decision, in real time, that can galvanize a team toward a huge win, or splinter it into a dozen pieces. The players have to understand what’s happening; the coach has to recognize the implications and proceed anyway.

With 7 minutes, 32 seconds left in Game 4 on Friday, TD Garden was coming unglued. Boston’s Jaylen Brown had just converted a Stephen Curry turnover into a hanging fast-break lay-in — and Jordan Poole pushed the Celtics’ Marcus Smart as the ball fell through the net, drawing a loose ball foul in the process. Boston was up 90-86. Boston was closing in on a 3-1 lead, which would put them a game from their franchise’s 18th title, and the Warriors were in deep trouble. Golden State called time. Smart had a free throw coming when the Warriors broke their huddle.

And when they did, Draymond Green was still on the bench. At winning time.

(Photo: David Butler II / USA Today)

BOSTON — For this to enter the top level of Steph Curry’s pantheon performances, a 43-point masterpiece to rip home-court advantage away from the Celtics, the Warriors needed to win. To win, Curry needed some level of help. Klay Thompson and Draymond Green, his two most famous co-stars, didn’t provide enough of it. So, with the series hanging in the balance, who would?

Andrew Wiggins, Jordan Poole and Kevon Looney.

Golden State coach Steve Kerr assessed every level of the Warriors’ Game 3 loss and opted for, among other adjustments, a pair of rotation tweaks that might sound counterintuitive. Kerr replaced Looney with Otto Porter Jr. in the starting lineup, hoping to spread the floor wider with Green out there to open the game, but he also planned to use Looney more often, despite the initial benching.

“I didn’t play him enough in Game 3,” Kerr conceded. “That was my mistake.”

(Photo: Paul Rutherford / USA Today)

1. Steph Curry: 34.3 points, 6.3 rebounds, 3.8 assists, 2.0 steals, 50.0 percent FG, 49.0 percent 3FG, 83.3 percent FT
2. Jaylen Brown: 22.3 points, 7.0 rebounds, 3.8 assists, 44.0 percent FG, 35.5 percent 3FG, 80.0 percent FT
3. Jayson Tatum: 22.3 points, 7.0 rebounds, 7.8 assists, 34.1 percent FG, 45.2 percent 3FG, 73.1 percent FT
4. Andrew Wiggins: 16.5 points, 8.5 rebounds, 1.5 assists, 1.3 blocks, 43.3 percent FG, 31.8 percent 3FG, 70.0 percent FT
5. Marcus Smart: 15.5 points, 4.5 rebounds, 4.8 assists, 1.8 steals, 44.2 percent FG, 38.5 percent 3FG, 75.0 percent FT

BOSTON — Draymond Green and Steve Kerr walked the thinnest, sharpest splinter of NBA tightrope on Friday and the Warriors lived to tell about it. And what a time for it. My goodness, what a time to push this relationship, and maybe this Warriors era, about as far as it could go, all in public view.

And it all worked.

Of course, it took the greatest playoff performance of Stephen Curry’s career — and one of the best by anybody, at any time —to pull off the victory as all the other activity roiled the waves around him. That’s the main story. That’s the all-time headline to the Warriors’ epic 107-97 Game 4 win at TD Garden to even the NBA Finals at 2-2, heading back to Chase Center for Game 5 on Monday night. Curry’s 43 points and 10 rebounds in 41 masterpiece minutes were the stuff of instant legend, performed by a legend.

But Kerr and Green weren’t exactly bit players in this. Their interplay was the background for Curry’s greatness. This was the context. This was the drama that made Curry’s moments even more powerful and meaningful. How do they survive a series with Green almost entirely neutralized, as he has been for most of this one by the long, athletic Celtics, who eat up his drives and dare him to pull up and shoot as much as he’d like?

This is how.

(Photo: Paul Rutherford / USA Today)

The Celtics had navigated their way through so many things in the NBA Finals, but there was still one thing they hadn’t seen: crunchtime. More precisely, a dynasty in crunchtime.

The Celtics were rolling Friday when Jaylen Brown picked off a reckless Steph Curry pass with 7 minutes, 39 seconds left in the game and hit a circus shot to regain a two-possession lead. But that didn’t last long. It rarely does against Curry. It rarely does against a group that has spent its whole career in the finals.

Boston would hit two shots the rest of the night as the Warriors went on a 21-6 run to send the finals back to San Francisco tied at two games each with a 107-97 win.

They’ve seen so many times how Curry can seem dormant and then suddenly explode before you see it coming. That’s why you always have to see it coming.

(Photo: Paul Rutherford / USA Today)

When the Celtics needed their offense to step up — when they needed someone to match buckets with the incredible Steph Curry — they produced too many broken possessions down the stretch of a 107-97 Game 4 loss.

“There’s a lot of things we wish we would have done differently, especially on the offensive end,” Jayson Tatum said. “I think we just got way too stagnant late in the fourth from everybody.”

(Photo: Paul Rutherford / USA Today)

It’s the stat that continues to tell the tale for the Celtics in this postseason. They finished with 16 turnovers and gave up 19 points off them. It moved their playoff record this year to 1-6 when they turn the ball over at least 16 times. When it’s 15 or fewer, the Celtics are 13-2. More goes into it than just this, obviously, but the Celtics were sloppy with the ball early and often. It allowed the Warriors to avoid getting down big and keep up with Boston step for step. Boston quite possibly handed the ball to the Warriors with 10 of those coming on live-ball turnovers.

(Photo: Kyle Terada / USA Today)

Twitter is buzzing after Steph Curry's for 43-point, 10 rebound performance.

LeBron, CJ McCollum, Eric Paschall and others chimed in on Steph's greatness.

The Golden State Warriors evened the Finals with a 107-97 win over the Boston Celtics in Game 4, behind 43 points from Stephen Curry.

Pivotal Game 5 is at 9 p.m. eastern on Monday in San Francisco. With the win Friday in Boston, the Warriors have now won at least one road playoff game in 27 consecutive seasons.

Read more here.

The Celtics left Rob Williams in there a minute too long as he started calling to the bench for a sub and the Warriors pounced with a 7-0 run and never looked back.

That’s how quickly the game flips against the Warriors, against a dynasty still going strong.

That's a 27th consecutive playoff series the Warriors have won a road game. NBA record. This was among the most impressive and insane road wins of this era.

Short list of Steph Curry's most defining career performances: 43 points to rip homecourt back from Boston.

As the great Rudy Tomjanovich once said: "Don't ever underestimate the heart of a champion."

The Warriors, somehow, found a way to win.

Two straight Celtics plays, two straight times Klay Thompson refused to let Jaylen Brown drive to his right. Boston had to settle for two rushed 3s that missed.

Underrated, huge plays by a guy who has not played well this series.

Draymond has been really bad offensively in this game. But that one possession, the chemistry between him and Curry paid huge dividends.

He was trapped at the free throw line. He knew to look for Curry and hit Curry perfectly with a pass for a catch-and-shoot 3.

Steph Curry up to 38 points, 10 rebounds. Andrew Wiggins at 17 points, 15 rebounds.

If the Warriors pull this out, they are the top two reasons.