(Basketball news) The Golden State Warriors progressed to the next round after they won the series 4-1 when they defeated the Denver Nuggets 102-98 in game 5. For the Warriors, Curry scored 30 points in his return to the starting five as Draymond Green had 11 points and six assists. Klay Thompson and Gary Payton added 15 points. For the Nuggets, Jokic scored 12 of his 30 points in the final 3:46 and finished with 19 rebounds and eight assists as DeMarcus Cousins contributed 19 points off the bench against his former Golden State team, and Aaron Gordon added 15 points and nine rebounds. With this result the Warriors progressed to the semifinals where they will face the winners of Grizzlies vs Timberwolves.

''Tonight was just a weird feeling because we hadn't been there in a while,'' said Curry, last season's NBA scoring champion. ''We wanted it so bad, it kind of made it a lot more difficult on ourselves. But we still remember how to do it, which is a good feeling.''

''I was a witness, letting him cook and creating plays for him. Try to get him open looks and after that, you know what he does,'' Warriors guard Gary Payton II said.

''He was incredible, both ends of the floor, big shots, big plays,'' teammate Draymond Green said.

''That guy is a warrior. I just don't understand the people that find a way to criticize Nikola Jokic. Is he perfect? No, I'm not saying he is,'' Nuggets coach Michael Malone said. ''But the guy is the definition of a warrior – competitive, consistent. He impacts the game in so many ways. Hell of a season. Hopefully he'll win the MVP again. I think rightfully he deserves it.''He's our leader, our longest-tenured player, our MVP,'' Thompson said of his Splash Brother, ''and without him, life is difficult. Steph Curry is one of a kind, and will continue to do the spectacular and make it look effortless.''

''He's our leader, our longest-tenured player, our MVP,'' Thompson said of his Splash Brother, ''and without him, life is difficult. Steph Curry is one of a kind, and will continue to do the spectacular and make it look effortless.''

The Milwaukee Bucks progressed to the next round as they beat the Chicago Bulls 116-110 and took the series 4-1. For the Bucks, Giannis Antetokounmpo had 33 points and nine rebounds as Pat Connaughton went 6 of 9 on 3-point attempts and scored 20 points, Bobby Portis added 14 points and a career-high 17 rebounds. For the Bulls, DeRozan was held to 11 points while shooting 5 of 10 as Patrick Williams scored 23 points, Nikola Vucevic 19 and Coby White 17 for the Bulls. Vucevic also had 16 rebounds and six assists. With this result the Bucks now face the in-form Boston Celtics in the Eastern Conference semifinal playoffs.

“After Game 2, we kind of talked about how we knew what the deal was,'' Antetokounmpo said. ''The team knew what the deal was. We knew what we had to do. We had to be desperate. We had to go out there and compete at a high level, pay attention to detail as much as possible, and help one another defensively. We've got to do it as a team.''

''We've been talking about the depth of the roster, the quality of the roster a lot this season,'' Bucks coach Mike Budenholzer said. ''Other guys have gotten opportunities and played well. Our defense has tightened up, and we've learned hard from these three games. We've got depth. We've got a good group.''

''This was a lot of our guys' first rodeo, just understanding what it's like to compete in a playoff series,'' Chicago's DeMar DeRozan said. ''There's so much you can learn from that experience, especially going against the defending champs.''

''It was pretty obvious they were going to load up on DeMar,'' Bulls coach Billy Donovan said. ''I thought he played a great game. I thought he generated good shots. He didn't have a high assist total because we really didn't shoot the ball particularly well, but he would have had an enormous amount of assists if we had shot the ball better.''

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