SAN FRANCISCO – Backup forward Kyle Anderson powered through an and-1 layup with 5:45 left Wednesday night to give the Warriors a 96-93 lead over the Thunder. It forced a timeout for Oklahoma City, the brief highlight of a game that left Golden State trailing almost the entire way.

But the momentum quickly dissipated. Anderson missed the free throw after the timeout and the Warriors failed to score on nine consecutive possessions. They went from 5:45 to 19 seconds and were stuck at 96 points, a lengthy drought that handed them a third straight loss, dropping them to 12-6 on the season.

“It’s kind of like pick-and-roll time late in the game (in the NBA),” Steve Kerr said. “Now that Steph (Curry) is out, it makes it a little bit more difficult for our team.”

Despite averaging just 29.7 minutes per game, Curry has gotten into foul trouble early this season, Kerr said. He has appeared on the injury report a few times lately with left knee bursitis. There was talk internally that he missed the second night of a back-to-back road in San Antonio last Saturday.

But Curry played against the Spurs instead and played again two nights later, logging 94 minutes over four days. Curry’s patellar tendonitis causes pain in both knees. He had an MRI on Tuesday which came back clean. But chief medical decision maker Rick Celebrini suggested he miss Wednesday’s game against the Thunder, giving him a few extra days of rest before Saturday’s game in Phoenix.

That left the Warriors without Curry against the Thunder’s fierce defense, which currently ranks first in the NBA. In contrast, with the game on the line, Golden State had a series of erratic possessions that ended in contested fadeaways from Andrew Wiggins and Jonathan Kuminga, turnovers or rushed jumpers late in the clock.

“I thought we were spread out a little bit and that’s on me,” Draymond Green said. “The game is getting to that point, someone has to slow the game down and get us into a set. I’m the veteran out there. I’m the one with the most experience out there. So I have to get my head out of my head and go get the ball and get us into a set. Something we would all benefit from.”

Without Curry, Kerr decided to go small with his starters for the first time this season. Brandin Podziemski started in place of Curry and Kuminga replaced Trayce Jackson-Davis and bumped Green to the center spot.

Podziemski and Kuminga – who were expected to get a bump in scoring responsibility – started extremely slowly and the Warriors immediately dug a double-digit gap. But both brought more momentum in the second quarter and were a big part of the third-quarter surge after Thunder wing Jalen Williams left the game and injured his eye during a Kuminga poster dunk.

Podziemski had 12 points and five assists. It was a small step forward as he tries to climb out of his offensive slump. Backup two-way guard Pat Spencer turned the game around with his energy in the second quarter. Kuminga scored a team-high 19 points on 8 of 21 shooting.

“JK came and did a great job after that first (stint) when he was rusty,” Kerr said. “We will definitely play in that smaller lineup with JK among the four and Draymond among the five coming up. But my feeling would be to keep starting like we started with Trayce and Draymond.

Kerr said ahead of the match that he knows Kuminga would ‘prefer to start’ but would like to see him as the team’s goalscorer from the bench