The Golden State Warriors erased a 25-point deficit to beat the Los Angeles Lakers 112-95 on Friday night at Chase Center in San Francisco, in a Warriors comeback against the Lakers that set two shot-clock era marks in the same game. Stephen Curry scored 31 points and dropped Luka Doncic to the floor with a third-quarter crossover that became the night’s defining play.
FINAL: Golden State Warriors 112, Los Angeles Lakers 95. Golden State trailed 38-15 after the first quarter, answered with a 38-15 second quarter of its own to tie the game 53-53 at halftime, and outscored Los Angeles 59-42 after the break. Doncic finished with a game-high 37 points, seven rebounds and five assists in the loss.
How to watch: Golden State Warriors vs Los Angeles Lakers, Friday, October 30, 2026, 10:00 p.m. ET at Chase Center in San Francisco
Warriors Comeback Against The Lakers Sets Two Shot-Clock Era Marks
The record book is the story, and it is not one record but two. By tying the game at halftime, Golden State became the first team in the shot-clock era, including the playoffs, to trail by 23 or more points at the end of the first quarter and be tied or better at halftime. No team had done it since the shot clock arrived in the 1954-55 season. The second mark came at the final buzzer: the 17-point margin was the largest victory in the shot-clock era by a team that trailed by 20 or more points at the end of the first quarter. The previous best also belonged to the Warriors, who trailed Chicago 41-18 after one quarter on March 4, 1976 and won by 14, 124-110. A third framing of the same night, tracked in the play-by-play era since 1996, made the 17-point win the largest ever posted by a team that had trailed by 25 points in the same game.
The hole was real, and Doncic dug most of it himself. He scored 21 points in the first quarter on 7-of-12 shooting, with five three-pointers, five assists and two steals, while Golden State committed 10 of its 17 turnovers in the opening period. League notes from the night added that Doncic is the first player in NBA history with multiple career quarters of at least 20 points, five assists and five made three-pointers in a single frame. Los Angeles pushed the lead to 25 early in the second quarter, and the game looked finished. Instead, the second quarter mirrored the first almost exactly, with one difference: this time it was Golden State doing the running.
Curry Drops Doncic, Then Passes Wilkins On The Scoring List
Curry finished with 31 points on 11-of-23 shooting, eight of his 14 three-point attempts good, plus six assists and four rebounds. The play that will travel furthest came at the 6:22 mark of the third quarter, when Curry isolated Doncic on the perimeter, put a series of moves on him that sent the Lakers star to the floor, and stepped back for a three-pointer. Doncic answered with a three of his own moments later, but the exchange captured the night: the 38-year-old dictating terms against the player who had owned the first quarter. Curry kept his composure story simple when he spoke to the broadcast crew after the game. “I was just trying to get a little bit of space. I didn’t expect it to get that nasty, but it was one of those you gotta kind of keep your composure,” he said. “I remember James Harden had to do like the shimmy to get himself going back in the day. I don’t know, I haven’t been that open in a long time.” He added: “I just love this game. All my mannerisms are just all over the place because I’m just having fun.”
The fourth quarter brought a quieter milestone with a longer shadow. Curry passed Dominique Wilkins, who scored 26,668 career points, for 18th place on the NBA’s all-time scoring list, moving past him with a three-pointer with 8:02 remaining. League notes also recorded that Curry, at 38 years and 230 days, joined LeBron James as the only players aged 38 or older to post a game of at least 30 points, five assists and eight made three-pointers. This was his second straight statement game in three nights, after a 44-point performance at Minnesota on Wednesday.
The Bench And Podziemski Finished What Curry Started
Comebacks of this size are never a one-man job, and the numbers behind Curry explain how a 25-point game became a 17-point win. Golden State’s bench outscored the Lakers’ reserves 50-7, and 30-3 across the first two quarters alone, when the game was being saved. De’Anthony Melton scored 16 points, 13 of them in the second quarter, including a personal 7-0 run inside the fightback. Georges Niang added 11 points and finished plus-21. Brandin Podziemski was the second Warrior all night: 21 points, six assists and five rebounds, three drawn charges in a span of five Lakers possessions during the decisive stretch, and the corner three late in the third quarter that gave Golden State its first lead since 2-0. Draymond Green ran the offence through the chaos with nine assists and three steals. Los Angeles, meanwhile, committed 22 turnovers and scored just 15 points in the fourth quarter, and Golden State outscored the Lakers 66-33 from three-point range across the night.
The Lakers did push back once. After halftime they rebuilt a nine-point lead in the third quarter, and for a stretch the comeback looked spent. Golden State closed the third on a 22-8 run, then scored the first 11 points of the fourth, a combined 33-8 flurry that turned a nine-point deficit into a 16-point lead. Los Angeles never got closer than 12 the rest of the way. The one Warrior who never joined the party was rookie Yaxel Lendeborg, whose billed matchup with Doncic after their opening-night clash fizzled: six points, five turnovers and a foul-out in the final minutes.
An NBA Cup Opener That Rewrites The Early Season Story
This was the NBA Cup opener for both teams, and the margin matters beyond the headline: point differential is a group-play tiebreaker, so a 17-point win banked after trailing by 25 is worth more in the standings math than an ordinary win. Golden State sits 1-0 in a group that also includes the Lakers, San Antonio Spurs, Portland Trail Blazers and Sacramento Kings. The wider season story flipped with it. The Warriors have won three straight after opening 0-3, the club’s worst start since drafting Curry, and the win tied the season series at 1-1 after the Lakers won the opener 127-105 in Los Angeles on October 21. Golden State is 3-3; Los Angeles falls to 4-2 despite Doncic’s 37.
What lasts from Friday night is the shape of the record. Teams have come back from 25 down before. No team in the shot-clock era had ever been buried by 23 after one quarter and walked into halftime level, and no team that deep in a first-quarter hole had ever won by this much. Curry supplied the highlight, the milestone and the closing argument in the same game, at 38, against the league’s leading early-season scorer. The Warriors host the Los Angeles Clippers on Sunday night. The Lakers host the Toronto Raptors the same night, carrying a loss that was a blowout win for exactly one quarter.
