OAKLAND, Calif. – To their chagrin, plenty of shots have been taken at the Golden State Warriors since winning their first NBA championship in 40 years last summer.

Injured All-Star guard Kyrie Irving said the Cleveland Cavaliers would have defeated Golden State in the NBA Finals if they were fully healthy. Charles Barkley seconded those words. The NBA’s general managers picked LeBron James and the Cavaliers to win the NBA title this season, and the Warriors aren’t Las Vegas favorites to repeat either.

But of all the disses, the one that seems to have burned the Warriors the most came from Los Angeles Clippers coach Doc Rivers.

“You need luck in the West,” Rivers told Grantland in early October. “Look at Golden State. They didn’t have to play us or the Spurs.”

Stephen Curry was feeling it as he scored 31 against the Clippers on Wednesday night. (Getty) More

As you can imagine, that didn’t sit well with the Warriors.

“That word pisses me and people in this locker room off because there was a lot of hard work that went into winning this championship,” Warriors guard Stephen Curry told Yahoo Sports after Wednesday night’s 112-108 win over the Clippers, Golden State’s 18th win in the series’ last 20 regular-season games. “While you were celebrating, you never want to hear somebody degrade what you did or what you accomplished.”

Warriors forward Draymond Green told Yahoo Sports: “At first when I heard it, I was pissed.”

The Warriors, the West’s lone undefeated team, opened 5-0 for the second straight season and became the first club to accomplish that feat since the 1995-97 Chicago Bulls. Curry, who scored a game-high 31 points, has scored 179 points through five games, which is the most since Michael Jordan had 182 during a five-game span to open the 1991-92 season.

Rivers, whose Clippers dropped to 4-1 on the season, has tried to clarify his “luck” remark several times, saying he meant no disrespect to the Warriors. After blowing a 10-point second-half lead Wednesday night, respect was the prevailing theme from the Clippers’ third-year coach.

“We had a lot of game-plan mistakes throughout the game,” Rivers said. “That’s the difference right now between us and them. Them being together; they execute.”

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While the talk of luck initially stung Green, he now feels differently, recalling words from Tom Izzo, his coach at Michigan State.

“Coach Izzo used to always tell us, ‘You got to be healthy, you got to be playing well and you got to have a little bit of luck,’ “ Green told Yahoo Sports. “But the first thing you heard was Doc Rivers saying that the Warriors were lucky; they didn’t play him or the Spurs. Man, that’s garbage. But when I sat down and thought about it, I wouldn’t necessarily say we were lucky for not playing either one of those teams. But in order to win, you got to be a little lucky.”

The rivalry between the Pacific Division powers is one of the best in the NBA, but fortunately there’s still room for some good humor.

Following the Warriors’ March 9 win over the visiting Clippers, then-Clippers guard Dahntay Jones bumped into Green while the Warriors’ forward was being interviewed live on television. Green took exception with Jones, who later said it was an accident, with an icy stare. The NBA would later fine Jones $10,000.

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