SAN FRANCISCO – The Warriors are choosing not to look at the cavalcade of beasts lurking as they enter the most treacherous part of their 2024-2025 NBA season. They are fixated on the first one that greets them, knowing it is as nasty as anything they will ever see.

The only team in the Western Conference with a better record than Golden State’s 12-5 comes to Chase Center on Wednesday. The Oklahoma City Thunder’s 13-4 record allows them to repeat as the No. 1 seed in the West.

And here are the Warriors, after missing the NBA playoffs last season, trying to not only get back to the postseason but prove they belong there and are good enough to make a deep run to make.

But first the immediate. The Warriors need to get off the floor. The losses to non-contenders in the San Antonio Spurs and Brooklyn Nets over the past five days have them trying to get up, regain their poise and see how good they can be. Still, they should know that if the Spurs and Nets can exploit them, the Thunder and the other monsters that follow can bury them.

“They have a great team,” center Trayce Jackson-Davis said of the Thunder. “They’re No. 1 and we’re No. 2. I’m pretty sure it’s going to be great (tonight). I can’t wait.”

Golden State dropped the Thunder 17 days ago, running away with a 127-116 victory in Oklahoma City. Still, that game provided a glimpse of the Warriors at their worst. They took a 28-point lead into the fourth quarter and had to withstand a late rally — OKC pulled within six with 4:46 to go — to come out on top.

The Warriors escaped that night, but their tendency to treat big leads with indifference is why they lost to the Spurs and Nets. It’s a dangerous game against even mediocre teams, which is why Golden State spent Tuesday in a lab undergoing some serious self-evaluation.

“These are games we have to close,” Kerr said. “And of course we face a difficult programme.”

What makes the Thunder particularly intimidating is their top-rated defense, their collection of two-way wings, led by Luguentz Dort and Jalen Williams, and casually spectacular All-NBA point guard Shai Gilgeous-Alexander.

“We can’t hurt him,” Kerr said of Gilgeous-Alexander. “That’s the most important thing when you play them. If he crosses the line twelve times, you take the ball out of the net and play against a solid defense. They are the No. 1 defense in the league. …But the transgressions are the killer. He’s going to make hard shots. But you can’t give him the easy things in transition, and you can’t give him the free throws.”

Gilgeous-Alexander is fifth in the NBA in scoring (29.2 points per game), ninth in steals (1.7) and 15th in assists (6.5 per game). He ranks second among guards in field goal percentage (50.9) and third among guards in blocks (1.1). His 8.0 free throw attempts per game rank fifth. Gilgeous-Alexander torched the Kings on Monday, producing 37 points and 11 assists in a 130-109 loss.

The most impressive thing about the Thunder is their depth. Defenders and shooters come in waves. Golden State’s win earlier this season was in large part the result of OKC center Chet Holmgren’s hip injury in the first quarter. The Warriors outscored the much smaller Thunder 95-63 over the next two-plus quarters.

Ten days after Holmgren went down, backup big man Isaiah Hartenstein made his Thunder debut. He is a few centimeters shorter than the more than two meter tall Holmgren, but compensates for that with about 40 kilos of muscle power. He averaged 15 points and 12 rebounds in his first two games.

Hartenstein presents different problems than Holmgren, but he is no less of a challenge for Golden State’s big man trio of Draymond Green, Kevon Looney and Jackson-Davis.

“Last year he played against Isaiah and he’s a big rebounder, he plays in the pocket with quick finishes,” Jackson-Davis said. “An underrated skill of his game is his passing. We’re just going to play him 1-on-1. Me and Loon, Dray. And then we want to strangle the shooters and make sure we cut off passes.”

The Warriors addressed the issues that plagued them in the past two games. They believed they had found enough solutions to become one of the most surprising teams in the league again during the first month of the season.

Golden State’s schedule is heading into a brutal stretch. There’s no better place to measure short-term progress than by facing the conference’s best first.

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