Warriors continue healing process with emotional win in first game..

Warriors continue healing process with emotional win in first game since death of coach Dejan Milojevic

SAN FRANCISCO The game’s opening basket was a fitting homage to Deki. most likely not for the reason you may have assumed.

Twenty-one seconds into the first quarter, Stephen Curry made a 3-pointer to start the scoring on the first possession of the first game

following the passing of Golden State Warriors assistant coach Dejan Milojevic. Everyone at the extremely emotional Chase Center

seemed to be cheering, screaming, and maybe even crying a little.

“My primary advice prior to the game was to simply immerse yourself in the game,” Warriors head coach Steve Kerr stated following

the team’s 134–112 victory over the Atlanta Hawks. “I think getting out and playing is probably the very best thing that, for players,

you can do to get their minds off of the sorrow that we’ve all felt this past week.”

But Curry didn’t start with that emotional bucket. Just moments before, he had missed the opening shot of the match, momentarily d

eflating an electorate on the verge of erupting.

He only received a second look as a result of Warriors center Kevon Looney’s signature one-handed offensive rebound—a no-jump

play. And whom do you believe Looney has given credit to for his progress in rebounding during the last three seasons? You could

practically feel the warmth of Coach Deki’s smile in that moment—a smile that Kerr and others

have mentioned several times in the last week.

Looney stated in the memorial video that aired before the game, “As soon as we met, we kind of hit it off.” “He wasn’t afraid to tell me

when I was wrong, and I kind of built that confidence in him and started building that trust and building

a relationship with him since Day 1.”

Curry beats his chest and raises one finger to the sky following almost every 3-pointer he makes, and there have been many. While

playing at Davidson, he created the gesture with his mother’s assistance as a reassuring reminder of his faith and family. He lifted two

fingers in honor of his fallen coach and flexed them to the sky on

Wednesday night after making the opening bucket.