Never was Stephen Curry's impact more clearly illustrated than when the Golden State Warriors struggled to even compete against the Minnesota Timberwolves without him. Curry was sidelined with a hamstring strain for all but 13 minutes of the Warriors' five-game elimination in the Western Conference semifinals,

With the Warriors down by 21 points and with just under four minutes left in the fourth quarter, Golden State head coach Steve Kerr decided to pull his key players from the floor, including Jimmy Butler and Draymond Green, and send some of the bench guys to the court to finish the contest, as noted by Jack Borman of “Locked On Sports Minnesota.”

All VanVleet did was knock down 6-of-9 3-point attempts in the game, starting with 2-for-3 shooting form the arc in the opening quarter, and finish with 29 points to lead the 115-107 Rockets win. Payton was ineffective, scoring five points and logging a minus-12 on the box score.