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OAKLAND, Calif. -- Panic was in the air. So were sounds of displeasure at each intermission and collective groans for every open shot Steph Curry clanked off the iron. The Warriors, who entered Tuesday night’s game as 16½-point favorites, were getting run out of their own building by the visiting 76ers. Through three quarters, they were dead.

This -- with Curry unable to knock down wide open shots, with the Warriors no longer able to use the grueling-schedule excuse after resting their starters Saturday, with the Warriors trailing by double digits entering the fourth quarter -- was rock bottom for a Warriors team that entered the game with five losses in its previous seven games.

And then something happened. The Warriors regained consciousness after napping through the first three quarters. It involved the 76ers, who put up 90 points in three quarters, panicking down the stretch as they tried to close out a championship-caliber team. It involved Warriors owner Joe Lacob assuming his own defensive stance. It involved Steph Curry, the birthday boy, finally making some of his open shots. In the end, the Warriors barely won, 106-104.

That something was Draymond Green, who morphed into a dragon to save the Warriors and put an (at least momentary) end to their “rut,” which is what he called it afterward. He dug up the Warriors out of the ground and breathed fire into their comeback.

He did it with offense. Green racked up eight assists and scored 20 points -- with 11 of those coming from the foul line. He knew the shots weren’t falling. So, he upped his aggression level on the offensive end. Green attempted a season-high 14 free throws.

It was, of course, a calculated move. After the game, Green talked about losing Kevin Durant and his six free throws per game as the reason behind his frequent trips to the foul line.

“You lose that, so I knew that I had to be a little more aggressive,” Green said. “That doesn’t necessarily mean score, but at least be more aggressive and attack more. Tonight, I was able to get to the free-throw line to help.”

Most importantly, he totaled eight rebounds, four steals and six blocks. Even still, that stat line doesn’t do his performance justice. There really isn’t a way to quantify his outing, though his plus-15 in a two-point game certainly comes close. In that fourth quarter, when the Warriors outscored the 76ers by 14 points, Green turned the tide.

But it actually began in the second quarter, when Green gave a speech to the team about breaking out of their rut. Steve Kerr explained after the game:

Or as Klay Thompson put it, “Draymond is always vocal.”

“Just continue to remind guys that we’ve been in a little bit of a rut,” Green said, describing his message to the team. “The only way to change that is to grind yourself out, grind your way out of it. Like I said, it’s not going to be pretty. The shots just aren’t going to fall. That’s just the way the game works. You don’t go into a rut and then come out and hit 20 3s. It just doesn’t work like that. You have to grind yourself out, grind your way out of it.”

He continued: “But just put your head down and go defend and the offense will come. Once we started to defend, everything else started to go our way.”

Green might’ve laid the foundation before the fourth quarter, but the rally really didn’t begin until then, when the Warriors pieced together a 15-2 run.

Curry finally made some shots. After going 2 for 8 on his attempts from beyond the arc through three quarters, he went 3 for 5 from 3-point range in the final frame. Curry -- who entered the game 18 for 76 from deep since Feb. 27, when he went 0 for 11 against the 76ers in Philadelphia -- rediscovered his touch for a few minutes. He never stopped shooting.

He was seemingly sparked by Green’s defense. As Kerr said after the game, â€œIt’s funny how energy and made shots often go together.”

This is what that looks like:

Once the Warriors grabbed the lead, they were in need of stops down the stretch. That’s exactly what Green did. In the final minute, with the Warriors winning by three, Green turned away T.J. McConnell at the rim, notching his third block of the fourth quarter.

His contributions didn’t end there. In the final seconds, with the difference still at three points, Matt Barnes raced down the court for a put-away dunk. Somehow he missed, and the 76ers came back the other way trying to set up a final shot at sending the game to overtime.

They never got the chance. Green wisely fouled Dario Saric before he could turn to face the hoop. The clock expired after Saric intentionally missed the second free throw and the 76ers couldn’t gather the ball. And so, the Warriors won a game they should’ve won, yet had no business winning after the first three quarters.

“He just kind of willed himself to another level,” Curry said. “Really, he was a huge catalyst for us.”

All of this doesn’t mean, of course, that the Warriors are back. In this post-Durant world, they still have some lineup issues. Their bigs got destroyed by the 76ers’ bigs. There’s no way to know for sure if Curry’s funk (he refuses to call it a slump) is over. It’s really not worth getting worked up about a two-point win against the 76ers in Oakland. If they hadn’t won, this would’ve been a completely different kind of story.

But for one night, Green was exactly what the Warriors needed in a time of desperation. Green, once again, proved why he’s arguably their most important player and, of course, warrior.