By Ben Leonard
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AP photo: The Golden State Warriors Stephen Curry goes for a lay up on the San Antonio Spurs Manu Ginobili (20) at Oracle Arena Thursday night

It wasn’t always pretty, but the Warriors (70-9) found a way to grit through early struggles to topple the San Antonio Spurs (65-13) and claim the Western Conference title with a 112-101 victory. In the process, they became only the second team in NBA history to reach the 70-win plateau.

In the early going, it didn’t seem too promising — Draymond Green got into foul trouble and the Warriors’ offense stalled, scoring just six points in the first six minutes. After a crushing loss to the Minnesota Timberwolves on Tuesday, Golden State’s prospects of setting the all-time NBA wins record seemed grim.

But as they usually do, the Warriors found a way to kick it into another gear. Stephen Curry led the way for Golden State with 27 points, Harrison Barnes continued his offensive resurgence with 21 points, and Green dropped 18 to help the Warriors’ offense come back to life.

Now, with three games remaining and the West in the Warriors’ hands, the question becomes whether or not to sit the Warriors’ regulars to rest them for the playoffs. Resting them would also imply a wish to prevent a potentially catastrophic injury to one of the Warriors’ key players, but Warriors’ head coach refutes that notion: “It’s not that I’m worried about injury,” Kerr said in his press conference streamed on KNBR. “You can get injured in practice. It’s not so much that I want to get guys to avoid an injury, but that we have a back-to-back and three games in four nights [to close the season].”

Kerr has largely left the decision up to the players, who will convene tomorrow with the coaching staff to discuss the issue. He hasn’t decided yet, but given his players’ health and ability to recover, he seems to be leaning toward gunning for the record:

“The good news for us is that the guys that need rest have gotten rest — [Andrew] Bogut, Andre [Igoudala], Shaun Livingston — and the rest of our core recovers pretty quickly,” Kerr said. “I’m not sure that they actually need a rest physically, but maybe a break mentally would do them some good. I’m pretty sure we’re not going to be in this position next year — you can’t keep winning at this level. It’s a unique situation to be in this position, and most of our guys really want to do this.”

If they want to break the ’95-’96 Bulls’ high water mark of 72 wins, they have to win all of their remaining three games: Saturday in Memphis, Sunday in San Antonio, and the season finale at home against Memphis. Golden State has won its meetings with Memphis by an average of 33 points this season, while they dropped their only game in San Antonio this season, a city in which they haven’t won since 1997. In short, the Warriors will have to overcome history if they want to make history. But as we’ve seen all season long, they’ve got it in them.