Don't Even Think About Writing Off the Golden State Warriors Yet

OAKLAND — Even without Stephen Curry, the Golden State Warriors aren't done—thanks partly to the increasingly fickle injury luck knocking down Western Conference stars left and right, but mostly to their fervent belief in themselves.

"Our confidence level with Steph is through the roof," Draymond Green said Tuesday. "Without Steph, it's still at the roof."

The Warriors face the Houston Rockets in a potentially (let's be serious: almost certainly) decisive Game 5 Wednesday. And even if they won't admit they're looking ahead, they have to be. Mostly because the Los Angeles Clippers announced Tuesday that Chris Paul and Blake Griffin will be out indefinitely and for the duration of the playoffs, respectively, which forces the view forward.

Paul and Griffin's injuries put the Clippers' first-round survival against the Portland Trail Blazers in serious doubt. And suddenly, improbably, miraculously, the Warriors' path to the conference finals looks nearly as smooth as it did before Curry went down with a MCL sprain. The real danger lurks in that penultimate stage—in the form of either the Oklahoma City Thunder or San Antonio Spurs—but Curry might well be back by then.

And there is very little that seems dangerous to the Warriors when their best player is healthy.

Now, so soon after their foundation was shaken by one fateful midcourt slip, the Warriors are a steadied outfit—assured they can succeed until Curry returns.

They intend to do it collectively, without stretching individual skills beyond comfort zones.

This is a realistic approach.

As Kevin Pelton of ESPN.com noted, they'll enter the conference semifinals as heavy favorites even with Curry sidelined:

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Even without Curry, the Warriors would be strong favorites over the Blazers. I estimate a 77 percent chance Golden State would beat Portland if Curry does not play at all, which improves to 87 percent if Curry is able to return after Game 4 -- when the timetable Golden State released would have Curry reevaluated in two weeks.

A Warriors-Clippers matchup is much more difficult to project because of all the injuries on both sides, but if Paul is unable to return for the postseason, the Clippers look like less formidable opponents than the Blazers, particularly with Griffin out and fellow starter J.J. Redick dealing with a painful heel contusion.

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Based on the way the Warriors distributed Green and Klay Thompson's minutes in Games 2 and 3 against Houston (contests Curry missed), Pelton pegged the Curry-less Dubs as a team with a net rating of plus-6.0 points per 100 possessions—a number you'd associate with a 57-win team. When you combine the stats with the way Golden State utterly trounced the Rockets in the third quarter of Game 4 (after Curry went down), it's easier to understand the somewhat reserved approach many key Warriors are taking toward the upcoming weeks.

They know they have what it takes to survive.

"I don't think it was an emotional response," Green said of that dominant third quarter in Game 4. "We locked in to play the type of basketball that we have to play. We move the basketball, we push the basketball, we cut, we screen. ... You watch the film of our play in that third quarter, the pace was completely different. That’s just the way we have to play, and I think it’s sustainable because it’s not the first time we’ve done it."

Stylistically, Golden State doesn't need to innovate to survive. Instead, it must defend like the team that topped the NBA in defensive efficiency last season and was tied for fourth while coasting for long stretches this year. As Green alluded to, the Warriors feast when stops turn into transition opportunities during a fast-paced game. Without Curry to threaten defenses in the half court, scoring in scattered situations will be critical.

But again, this isn't some new stratagem. Generating stops and running have been key parts of the Warriors' attack all along.

"That's us," Harrison Barnes said simply, describing the way the Warriors flew around in that feverish third quarter against the Rockets on Sunday.

The Warriors just need to be themselves.

Curry's replacement has no intention of emulating the MVP.

"I've got to be more aggressive, just because of the production that's out," Shaun Livingston said. "But I don't expect to make all that up. This guy leads the league in scoring. He's the Most Valuable Player."

Livingston will operate from the post and in the mid-range area. He'll distribute, switch on defense and slip in backdoor for dunks. He won't be firing 30-footers or flipping in wrong-footed scoop shots in traffic. That's not him.

Thompson may be the one exception to the "everybody stay in your lane" approach. He is the only must-cover shooter in Golden State's rotation with Curry out.

Houston has had success at times denying Thompson the ball altogether, effectively daring the other four Warriors to generate offense themselves. Because Livingston and Andre Iguodala, two players who figure to do much of the ball-handling with Curry sidelined, can more safely be ignored off the ball, the Dubs can't simply put the rock in Thompson's hands to foil all of those denial attempts. Doing that would likely strand Livingston or Iguodala on the perimeter, where defenses could happily leave them and help elsewhere.

So, expect Thompson to be on the move. A lot.

"When Steph is out, Klay is more like a Reggie Miller player," Marreese Speights explained. "Coach wanted him running off screens with Andre and Shaun handling the ball. So it's something Klay's been working on."

Golden State doesn't have to be what it was with Curry to survive in this series or the next, but things will change after that. Playing like a 57-win team may not cut it against the potent Thunder, and it certainly won't do against a historically good Spurs team.

Noah Graham/Getty Images

Against whichever of those foes shows up in the conference finals, the Warriors must be brilliant.

And that, strangely, stands as the one constant amid the chaotic changes overtaking the West lately. The Warriors were always going to have to be their best to reach the Finals, and they were always going to need Curry at full strength to finish a 73-win campaign the way it ought to be finished: with a title.

If Curry isn't ready in a couple of weeks, all this talk of confidence and staying true to identity will ring hollow. Because nobody inside or outside the Warriors organization believes ordinary efforts from any roster—no matter how deep, confident or experienced—will be enough to get the job done.

Golden State must again become extraordinary sooner or later.

For now, thanks to the altered West landscape, ordinary is probably still good enough.

Follow @gt_hughes on Twitter.

Quotes obtained firsthand.