Kelley L Cox-USA TODAY Sports
It was Stephen Curry like James Wiseman had only seen him in pixelated form.
“It’s crazy,” the young big man said. “It reminded me of 2K because I used to play with Steph all the time, and I used to drop like 60. Just actually watching in person, that was phenomenal. He’s a legend.”
It was Stephen Curry like Steve Kerr nearly expected to see him.
“I had a feeling it was coming pretty quickly,” the coach said. “Because he’s looked great from the start of camp physically. But he’s barely played basketball the last year and a half.”
It was Stephen Curry like few have seen him, scoring at will in ways familiar and not. He was not raining 3s down from different area codes, flinging prayers that quickly were answered. It was methodical and precise, slashing moves that knifed him through Portland defenses, splitting defenders and finishing from everywhere. His career-high 62 points Sunday resulted from 8-of-16 shooting from deep. On Feb. 27, 2013, when he lit up Madison Square Garden for a then-best 54 points, he went 11-of-13 from 3.
This was different. This was…Jordanian?
“Cue the Jordan meme, right?” Curry said over Zoom after the Warriors’ 137-122 victory over the Trail Blazers at Chase Center. “I take all that personally.”
STEPHEN CURRY HAS 62 POINTS pic.twitter.com/oxCUmCpI5t
— KNBR (@KNBR) January 4, 2021
“All that” is quite a lot. The Warriors superstar erupted two days after Portland superstar Damian Lillard gave a face, rather than a Twitter egg, to the online chatter that Curry can’t do this alone. When the Warriors were the surprise and record-setting darlings of the NBA, he had Klay Thompson for defenses to panic about. Soon Kevin Durant was added, and the rich had won the lottery. Curry has always had help, which is much harder to come by this year, the Warriors starting very slowly.
“He’s seeing that it’s tough to get those quality looks right now,” Lillard had said on NBC Sports’ pregame show. “… It’s different than what it’s looked like the last four or five years.”
And so it was a different Curry who took the court Sunday, one game after Lillard’s Blazers smacked the Warriors by 25. His 21 points on 7-of-11 shooting in the first quarter would have been excellent entire games for mere mortals.
He had 31 at the half. Curry added another 31 in the second half — the first since Kobe Bryant on Dec. 20, 2005, to have 30 in each half — not much bothering with the moon shots from far, far back until the closing minutes, when he rattled off a pair of 3s. The baby-faced assassin’s weapon of choice was the dribble for most of play, breaking down the Portland defense and attacking the rim at will.
He shot 18-of-31 from the field and went 18-of-19 from the free-throw line. His one miss snapped a streak of 80 consecutive made free throws. “He just choked,” Kerr joked.
That’s 5️⃣0️⃣ points on 27 shots for Stephen Curry ? pic.twitter.com/jIQakttlcp
— KNBR (@KNBR) January 4, 2021
It was Stephen Curry as Draymond Green had rarely seen him. Not strictly playing within the flow of the offense but becoming the flow.
“Steph has a tendency at times to kind of f–k around with the basketball. There was no f–king around,” Green said. “He came out and everything was just shot or attack. Me, I watch a guy’s eyes — he never looked pass once at the beginning of the game.”
Curry entered averaging 6.6 assists per game. He had one in the first half and finished with four — a couple garbage-time dimes thrown in there.
There were no fans in attendance providing energy he could feed off, Kerr lifting him late so “the 42 people in the stands could give him a standing ovation.” If Curry wanted to find material to rev him up, though, he did not have to look far.
“Just an opportunity to kind of assert my will on the game early and try to create some energy,” said Curry, whose will and skill are beyond questioning.