Warriors cool Heat off, nail 36th home win

OAKLAND, California – Stephen Curry scored 31 points and Draymond Green added 22 points and 12 rebounds to lead the Golden State Warriors to their 36th straight regular-season home win, 111-103 over the Miami Heat on Monday night.

Klay Thompson added 17 points to help the Warriors (36-2) get halfway to Chicago’s record win total of 72 set in 1996-97 three games before the midpoint of the season.

Dwyane Wade scored 20 points and Chris Bosh and Gerald Green added 15 apiece for the Heat, who had won eight of their past 11 games here.

But these Warriors teams are far different and that showed against a resilient Heat team that battled all night but was unable to handle the depth of the Warriors despite the rare off-shooting night from Curry.

Curry missed seven of his first nine 3-point but got plenty of help as the Warriors tied the Philadelphia 76ers (1966-67) for the fourth longest regular-season home win streak in NBA history. Chicago holds the record of 44 set in 1996-97.

Back-to-back baskets by Green helped Golden State build a 10-point lead late in the third quarter before Miami responded with the final seven points to make it 80-77 heading into the fourth on Goran Dragic’s layup in the closing seconds.

Marreese Speights, who did not play the first three quarters, scored Golden State’s first six points of the fourth. The Warriors extended the lead to 88-79 on a basket by Harrison Barnes, despite the entire starting lineup resting to start the quarter.

Three free throws by Klay Thompson after he was fouled on a 3-point attempt by Gerald Green and a 3-pointer from Curry made it 101-88 midway through the fourth and Golden State went on to another win that was sealed with a 3-pointer by Curry that made it 110-101 with 26.9 seconds to go.

Miami played nearly flawless ball in the first half, committing just one turnover, assisting on 17 of 22 baskets and going on an 11-2 run midway through the second. But despite all that, the Heat still trailed 56-54 at the half when Curry hit two free throws in the closing seconds to give him 18 points at the break.

In New York, LaMarcus Aldridge had 25 points and 11 rebounds as the San Antonio Spurs extended their winning streak to eight with a 106-79 victory over the Brooklyn Nets in the latter’s first game since an organizational shake-up.

A day after coach Lionel Hollins was fired and general manager Billy King reassigned, the Nets dropped their 10th straight at home and fifth in a row overall.

“We ran into a sledgehammer of a team,” Brown said. “They definitely know how to play together and that’s something we’re going to strive and try to do here.”

Kawhi Leonard added 17 points for the Spurs, who go to Detroit on Tuesday before putting their 31-game home winning streak on the line Thursday in a showdown with Cleveland.