Steph Curry out of Game 1 with hamstring injury

Awful news.

The Golden State Warriors kicked off their Western Conference Semifinals matchup with the Minnesota Timberwolves on Tuesday night, and while they played well out of the gates, they still got hit with some very bad news: a potential Steph Curry injury.

Early in the second quarter, Curry appeared to tweak his hamstring. He grabbed his hamstring on a defensive possession, and was moving around very gingerly. He stayed in the game, and even made some shots, but kept grabbing at the hamstring, and eventually signaled to the bench that he needed to be replaced. At a stop in the action, Curry left not just the game, but the court, as he walked straight to the locker room with head trainer Rick Celebrini.

A few minutes later, the Warriors announced that Curry sustained a strained left hamstring, and would not return to the game.

Needless to say, it’s awful news for the Warriors, who were already underdogs in this series. They have a chance to steal a game or two without Curry, but the season is effectively over if Curry misses a sustained amount of time.

Curry was moving well enough after the injury to lend some optimism that it might not be too serious. But the Warriors wasted no time ruling him out for the rest of the game, which suggests that the training staff saw something concerning.

We’ll let you know when we have more updates, but this is now the biggest story in the series. The Warriors were winning at the time of Curry’s injury, so they’ll try to steal Game 1 even without their franchise player.