Steph Curry is giving us every reason to believe his best is yet to come
Golden State Warriors' Steph Curry has scored more than 30 points in
four of five games
>SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA – OCTOBER 14: Golden State Warriors’ Stephen
Curry (30) stretches before the start of their preseason NBA game at the
Chase Center in San Francisco, Calif., on Friday, Oct. 14, 2022. (Jose
Carlos Fajardo/Bay Area News Group)
By SHAYNA RUBIN | srubin@bayareanewsgroup.com | Bay Area News Group
PUBLISHED: October 29, 2022 at 5:45 a.m. | UPDATED: October 29, 2022 at
5:45 a.m.
https://www.eastbaytimes.com/2022/10/29/steph-curry-is-giving-us-every-reason-to-believe-his-best-is-yet-to-come/

The Warriors have played just five games, but already Steph Curry is
hinting at a career year.

One play in Golden State’s win against Miami on Thursday night told the
story.

The matchup was too good to be true: the Heat’s Tyler Herro defending
Curry with the game still in the balance.

Curry’s teammates sensed the opportunity on the inbound play with just
under six minutes to play and the Warriors up five, looking to create
some separation. Curry lobbed a pass to Kevon Looney, who found Klay
Thompson, who found a relocating Curry with Herro tagging along. Curry
danced Herro nearly to the ground as he drained a crucial 3-pointer.

“Steph was just sublime,” coach Steve Kerr said. “What he’s doing is
just incredible. He just gets by anybody. it doesn’t matter who’s on
him. He gets right into the teeth of the defense and finishes, finds
guys. He’s been spectacular here to start the year.”

Curry, who will turn 35 in March, is averaging 30.8 points per game with
six assists and six rebounds. That scoring average, if he keeps it up,
would be second to just the 32 points Curry averaged during the 2020-21
season. Only LeBron James (in all his five seasons with the Lakers) and
Kobe Bryant in 2012-13 season have averaged at least 25/5/5 in any
season played over the age of 34, according to Basketball Reference.
Curry has averaged more than 26.5 points just three times during his
first 13 seasons.

Thursday night, Curry banged his chest in a celebration he’d usually
save after nailing a playoff dagger — not a regular season game in late
October.

“He used to have irrational confidence,” Draymond Green said. “He
doesn’t have irrational confidence anymore. He has an earned confidence
that we all know and expect.”

After the game, Curry saw a text from his trainer marveling at the play.
It tracked a pattern they’d worked on all summer. Though Curry made the
play look effortless, even spontaneous, plenty of hard work went into it.

Curry’s been effortlessly brilliant this season so far. He led the
Warriors’ win on Thursday with 33 points, has scored at least 30 points
in four of the Warriors’ five games (he scored 21 in the loss to
Phoenix), and is making 3s at a 46 percent clip.

It’s safe to bet that trend continues when the Warriors visit his
hometown Charlotte Hornets to begin a five-game road trip on Saturday,
where Curry averages 26 points per game (two points above his career
average).

At age 34, Curry’s is defying his age. Something he attributes to a
dedicated, ever-evolving routine to take care of his body and
conditioning that goes beyond rigorous workouts. But is a well-kept secret.

“I think getting stronger definitely helps,” he said. “You could say I
improved there, because you can withstand a lot more physicality and
stuff. We talked a lot about that last year. But I am stubborn enough to
think I can do this for a lot more years and trying to prove that every
day with the work I put in every day. Try to make it look easy even
though it’s not.”

He also played 37 minutes on Thursday, not ideal for Kerr, who tries to
mitigate starters’ workload this early in the season. But with the young
second unit struggling to keep winnable games in hand and imminent rest
for the starters coming up during one of the two back-to-backs on their
first long road trip, Kerr and the Warriors decided to loosen the leash
to get a game they really wanted to win.

“I think I’m blessed with the way of approaching the game,” Curry said.
“The way I see it. The rationality behind it was it hadn’t been done a
certain way before. You try to create that, almost. Once you do, there’s
rationality that comes behind that. That’s what the expectation is. I
know what work goes in to make that a deserved confidence every time I
play. You try to enjoy what you do because you want to win and enjoy the
competition. And the comparison is always to yourself.”

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Shayna Rubin | General Assignment Sports Reporter
Shayna covers Bay Area sports for the Bay Area News Group. She covered
the Oakland A's from 2019 to 2021 and, most recently, the Golden State
Warriors' championship run in 2022. Shayna is a San Francisco native.