LOS ANGELES: The Golden State Warriors punched their ticket to the second round of the NBA playoffs on Sunday, shaking off two straight defeats to grab a 103-89 Game 7 victory over the Houston Rockets.
The Warriors were the last team to advance to the conference semifinals, which got under way earlier Sunday with the Indiana Pacers handing the Eastern Conference top seeds Cleveland a 121-112 defeat on their home floor.
On a Warriors team stacked with post-season experience, Buddy Hield — playing in his 11th playoff game — drilled nine three-pointers on 11 attempts on the way to a game-high 33 points.
Stephen Curry scored 14 of his 22 points in the fourth quarter as the Warriors finally frustrated the second-seeded Rockets, who were coming off two dominant victories and had visions of becoming just the 14th team to rally from 3-1 down to win an NBA playoff series.
“A lot of resilience,” Curry said. “Everybody stepping up. Everybody’s been talking about our team the last two games in terms of our execution, our energy, all that.
“We blocked it all out and just understood we had 48 minutes to dig deep. Everybody contributed.
“Buddy Hield was unbelievable,” added Curry after the Warriors lined up a second-round clash with the Minnesota Timberwolves, who ousted LeBron James and the Los Angeles Lakers in five games.
Curry’s first basket was a three-pointer with 33.3sec left in the first half.
But Hield was on fire, making six three-pointers on the way to 22 first-half points and Draymond Green added 10 points to help the Warriors to a 51-39 halftime lead.
They pushed the lead to as many as 15 before the Rockets battled back, cutting their deficit to three.
Amen Thompson scored 24 points and grabbed nine rebounds and Alperen Sengun scored 21 with 14 rebounds for the Rockets, but Houston made just six three-pointers and trailed 70-62 going into the fourth quarter.
That’s when Curry came alive, opening the final frame with five straight points. Jimmy Butler had six points in a 12-0 Warriors run that took their lead to 20 points with 2:31 remaining.
Butler finished with 20 points, and Curry said his arrival from Miami in February was key to Golden State’s late playoff push.
“For us to build chemistry on the fly and build trust on the fly and perform like we did in a game seven, it means the world,” Curry said.
“So mission accomplished — step one.”
In Cleveland, Andrew Nembhard drilled five of Indiana’s 19 three-pointers on the way to a team-high 23 points and Tyrese Haliburton scored 22 points and handed out 13 assists for the Pacers, who had six players score in double figures.
“I thought we did a great job of starting the game the right way,” said Haliburton, who had delivered the game-winner in the 119-118 overtime triumph that clinched the Pacers’ first-round victory over the Milwaukee Bucks.
Pascal Siakam scored 10 of his 17 points in the first quarter as Indiana took a 36-25 lead.
The Pacers overcame a 33-point performance from Cavs star Donovan Mitchell and 17 turnovers of their own that led to 22 Cleveland points.
The turnovers helped Cleveland claw back from a 12-point deficit early in the third, taking a one-point lead on Evan Mobley’s hook shot with 3:16 left in the period.
Mobley added 20 points and 10 rebounds, but the Cavaliers clearly missed All-Star point guard Darius Garland, who missed a third straight game with a sprained toe.
They couldn’t respond as Indiana put together a 15-4 scoring run to pull away again in the fourth quarter.
“We weathered the storm,” Haliburton said. “We did it by getting stops, getting out running and just playing Pacers basketball.”
