The Warriors season starts up tonight and in honor of the return of basketball, SFist Chris takes a look at the Warriors. ...

Here's todays news stories...

Here's todays wrapup of sports news...

Here's todays wrap up of the sports news...

Here's todays wrap up of the sports scores...

Here's todays sports wrapup...

Here's todays rounup of sports news....

Here's today's wrap up of sports news...

We're calling it right now -- cancel your reservations at the midtown Manhattan Day's Inn, cuz' ain't gonna' be no Warriors representative at this year's NBA Lottery. After 12 years, THE STREAK IS OVER -- your Golden State Warriors will make the playoffs this year as the number eight seed in the Western Conference.

Unlike Monte Poole or Tim Kawakami, there is no "will they or won't they" coming from SFist. This is a done deal. Their season-long fever has broken just in time, and the Warriors now have only to avoid full-scale collapse and they will walk into the playoffs unchallenged.

Over the last 12 years, nobody has really accused the Warriors of having their act together. They've burned through a litany of coaches, a couple of really bad GMs, and more than one first round draft choice with nothing to show for them but more new coaches, front office suits, and first round draft choices.

Another hallmark of the modern-day Warriors' mean mean stride has been their fast starts, awful middles, and decent finishes. Even in their worst years, the Warriors managed to finish the season on an uptick, perpetually giving false hope for the next season – even if that hope was just a Lottery pick.

This year had all the looks of more of the same, but a funny thing happened on the way to the cellar: the bottom fell out of the middle of the Western Conference.

-Warriors get beat down by the Clips, 103-90. Considering the Clippers are one of the teams that the Warriors need to pass in order to make the playoffs, that's a bad loss. -Stanford loses to UCLA, making them an official "bubble team" and Cal loses to USC making them an official .500 team. -The bad news: Sharks lose to Calgary. The good news: their round trip is over. Also, they didn't get in any ten......

You can exhale Warriors fans, there is hope. The universe works in mysterious ways, and yesterday, it worked for the Warriors.

Just when the flagging team needed it, on a day when they could only suit up seven players in a loss to the Clippers (as predicted by our LAist comrades), the Warriors announced that they had pulled off an almost unbelievable eight-player trade with the Indiana Pacers. And there is more good news. Some how, some way, VP of Basketball Operations Chris Mullin convinced his Indiana counterpart, Larry Bird, to take Mike Dunleavy and Troy Murphy. That's right! The Warriors unloaded both baby Duns and Man-o-War in one fell swoop. And it keeps getting better. In return, Mullin snagged Al Harrington to help bolster the frontcourt lineup and guard Stephen Jackson to, uh, help with the police lineup. Both teams also threw in a couple of redshirts to level out the financials and collective bargaining requirements, but even the redshirts are looking good.

-Sharks beat the Avalanche 3-1 after a stellar first period in which they scored two goals and had 21 shots on goal. ...

Dujuan Wagner, Adonal Foyle, and Zarko Cabarkapa are riding the pine in suits tonight. For the opposition Lakers, Kobe won't play, and Phil Jackson, Kwame Brown, and Aaron McKie, and Chris Mihm may not even make the trip. JRich is probable, maybe, hopefully.

Another meaningless preseason game? Nope, it's opening night tonight for the Warriors at the Oracle. Here's everything you need to know, from the Warriors perspective, and from ours....

The weeks starts out right when a sucker punch on the field lands Chicagoist in the middle of a Sox/Cubs throwdown and the fists continue to fly in the comments. Despite suburban resident Ms. Pinney's best little try no books will be banned anytime soon and the El is really really gross. Houstonist is there to start compiling the punditry when when the guilty, guilty Enron verdict comes down. This guy seems to be able......

Tonight is Playoff Time for the Warriors, or at least the only exciting thing to happen to the Warriors during playoff time-- the NBA Draft Lottery. This will be the eleventh consecutive year the Warriors will be part of the NBA's reality show, which means that, yes, now that the Clippers are a playoff team (or were) and look like they'll be a playoff team for years to come, the Warriors are the new Clippers. Yay, team! ...

We all acknowledge that as the Warriors' feel their way toward the playoffs this year, there will be some stumbles. Well, there are stumbles and then there are the kind of STUMBLES that make you realize this may have been the wrong week to quit sniffing glue. Last Wednesday against the defending NBA champeen San Antonio Spurs, the Warriors were stripped buck naked and exposed as pretenders. The Spurs absolutely had their way with the shell-shocked tribe. Can you say "low bridge"? It's pronounced Spurs 113 Warriors 89. ...

Listening to the pre-game show on KNBR 680 radio, there was a palpable sense of excitement crackling over the air waves. Announcers Time Roye and Jim Barnett spoke just a little faster and maybe an octave higher. The pregame interviewees sounded overnaturally excited for a game in the middle of November between two traditional dogs. But this ain't your older brother's Pacific Division any more. ...