Warriors-Wizards Preview

By ALAN FERGUSON

(AP) -- With Stephen Curry out, the Golden State Warriors fell short in their attempt to claim the opener to their longest road trip of the season.

A matchup with the slumping Washington Wizards on Tuesday night could give them an opportunity to get back in the win column even if their star point guard is again sidelined.

Golden State (43-10) opened its six-game trek - which completes a stretch of playing 10 of 11 on the road around the All-Star break - with a 104-98 loss to Indiana, a team currently just outside of playoff position.

With Curry nursing a sore right foot, Golden State made just one field goal in the final five minutes and was outscored 15-8.

"It is not easy without your best player," said guard Klay Thompson, who scored 39 points - his most since a career-high 52 on Jan. 23. "It doesn't matter who is in the game for us, we've got plenty of guys who can execute."

Curry, who missed his first game this season, is listed as questionable for Tuesday.

"I felt better and hopefully I'll be able to go (Tuesday)," he said after practice Monday. "I don't want to miss too much time so I'm trying to get it right for (Tuesday)."

The Warriors, who had their four-game winning streak snapped, now face a Wizards team which has dropped eight of 10.

A 106-89 defeat in Detroit on Sunday was Washington's third in a row, and the Wizards were outscored 59-37 in the second half.

"We played the last couple of quarters like it was a pickup game," coach Randy Wittman said. "It's a snowball effect. It is the little things that add up to big things, and they continue to get bigger and bigger as we speak."

Wittman's team is averaging 94.0 points in its eight games this month after scoring 100.2 per contest in their first 48. With 24 points Sunday, Marcin Gortat was the only Wizards player to score more than 12.

"Right now, we're not playing good," Wittman said. "It's not going to fix itself on its own. We're got to be more in tune to problem areas and making it different. We can't go out and hope things are going to change. We've got to go out and change.

"We can't let adversity deflate us like we have."

The Wizards ended a six-game losing streak to Golden State in the most recent meeting Jan. 28, 2014. They limited the Warriors to 37.5 percent shooting in an 88-85 road win and held Thompson to 13 points on 5-of-17 shooting.

Bradley Beal led Washington with 20 points in that victory but is expected to miss his sixth straight game due to an injured right leg. Wizards leading scorer John Wall (17.3 ppg) totaled 29 points and missed 20 of 30 shots in last season's two games against Golden State, including a fourth consecutive home loss in the series.

Thompson scored 26 points and was 6 of 9 from beyond the arc as Golden State won its fourth straight game in Washington, 112-96 on Jan. 5, 2014. He is 15 from 23 from 3-point range in three lifetime games in the nation's capital.