WASHINGTON -- The Golden State Warriors were silent in the locker room, seated, staring into their phones, for roughly 10 minutes. Despite all the time that had passed from the final buzzer, to and through Steve Kerr's news conference, most of the players were still in their uniforms, and only center Zaza Pachulia had started the process of hitting the showers.

Usually, by this juncture, the locker room is a bustling cacophony as a small, swaggering army simultaneously changes and gets out of dodge. On Tuesday night, they were sitting in whatever just happened. Draymond Green, ever the effusive talker, couldn't suppress some muted chatting with guard Ian Clark. Everyone else was cordoned off, deep into the worlds inside their phones.

This carried the aura of a stinging playoff loss, and forward David West even called Tuesday night "a playoff-type game," but in truth this could be worse. Until the answers flow into the Warriors' and eventually everyone else's phones, concern is a placeholder on everything else. Andre Iguodala flipped the question on team sentiment back in the other direction: "Don't you always want to hope for the best?"

Because, while it's in Golden State's power to improve their crunch-time execution, "hope for the best" is about all they can do regarding the bigger problem, the one casting a shadow cool enough to chill a team into silence.

The Washington Wizards edged the Warriors on Tuesday, 112-108, which now seems ancillary, after Kevin Durant missed nearly the whole game with a left knee injury of a nature currently unknown. The Warriors say they'll release the results of an MRI tomorrow. Then we will know which loss was the real one: 112-108 or KD?

Despite Durant's absence, the game featured a fantastic, thrilling finish, and Golden State again came up short in crunch time.

For the Warriors, it was another slow start, nearly rectified by a monster third quarter, but ultimately most notable for the scariest of circumstances. At the 11:03 mark of the first quarter, Marcin Gortat fouled Zaza Pachulia, sending the Warriors center tumbling into Durant's legs like a dangerous domino. Durant hopped away, in pain, holding his left leg. At the 10:26 mark, he asked Kerr to call timeout, and, after meeting with trainers, ended his evening with a walk to the locker room.

"It was just a basketball play. Right?" Pachulia said, looking to the media horde for some reassurance before emphasizing, "No, I didn't know he was behind me."

He then asked another, intentionally tongue-in-cheek question: "You guys think I did it on purpose?"

Nobody should blame Pachulia for getting pushed and falling into Durant's leg, but in times of disappointment, people look to blame someone, anyone. If this is where Golden State's season goes awry, the culprit is basketball, the chaos of bodies and limbs that simply cannot be air-traffic controlled in the moment. It was easy to assume the Warriors would traipse to a title, given their talent, but probabilities aren't inevitabilities, especially when there are 82 games of vulnerability.

Without Durant, Golden State played lethargically, something they're quite capable of on the road with or without their full complement. After falling behind by 19 in the first quarter, they whittled the lead down to 12 at halftime. The Warriors emerged from the second half with a renewed focus. In some ways, a failed possession presaged their run. A bad pass by Warriors guard Patrick McCaw fueled what should have been an easy Wizards fast break, but a scrambling defensive effort influenced Markieff Morris and John Wall each to miss at close range in transition before Wall finally scored.

Warriors guard Stephen Curry, who'd missed his previous 14 3-point attempts dating back to Monday's game against the 76ers, finally swished one, and the comeback was on. It was helped along by Pachulia. After the unfortunate incident in the first quarter, he bashed his way to the bonus for Golden State. The Warriors took the lead at 2:10 remaining in the third quarter, and then the lead seemed to constantly change ownership from that point forward.

Warriors forward David West made the defensive play of the game when he rejected what should have been a Wall layup after Wall had McCaw badly beaten with a slick, behind-the-back dribble. But there was more drama in the offing.

Crunch time was a glorious back-and-forth, replete with high-energy, high-effort play.

With 2:46 left, Wizards forward Otto Porter claimed a 2-point lead off an incisive Bradley Beal pass to the corner 3 area. That was rebutted by Warriors guard Klay Thompson's drive past Gortat and pass to Draymond Green for a corner 3, which put the Warriors up by one. Beal responded with a tough runner through traffic for a one-point Wizards edge. The next play was an uncharacteristic one from Curry: He eschewed a 3 over Gortat, who had switched defensively, and the possession ended in a turnover by Iguodala. Beal continued his fine work by drawing a foul on Shaun Livingston, and Beal's two free throws made the score 106-103 Wizards.

Green evened the action with an angle 3-pointer after a botched possession. That gain was immediately undone when Green lost Morris for an alley-oop. Then Curry scrambled past the entire Wizards defense for a tying layup with 41 seconds remaining.

Washington made an odd choice, rejecting the two-possessions-for-one opportunity as Wall was isolated against Thompson. The poor approach was bailed out by an incredible effort by Porter, who snatched Wall's midrange miss and drew a foul on Curry that led to two free throws and a two-point Wizards edge.

For the Warriors' last gasp, they went no timeout off the free throw, and Curry found himself inexplicably open from deep with six seconds remaining. Subjectively, it seems that shot goes in last season. This season has been more fraught for the league's reigning MVP, especially at the end of games. The attempt missed long.

An unfortunate result for the Warriors, but it's nothing compared with their worst fears at the moment. It was a rough evening for Golden State, but the MRI results for Durant could be a salve. It could, however, also make this night much worse, one to remember for the most awful of reasons. Only a very brief stretch of time will tell.