Steph Curry and the Warriors Broke All Kinds of Records Last Night
The Golden State Warriors' record-breaking, gravity-defying season continues. At this point, it's easy to take it all for granted, to get almost complacent as an observer to this level of unrelenting success. The Warriors seem to win every game; Steph Curry seems to get insane buckets every game; the Internet-at-large seems to fawn over the whole operation every game. But last night's surprisingly narrow victory over the Orlando Magic was remarkable in its own right, not least because the league's dominant force was coming off a shock loss to the bottom-of-the-barrel Los Angeles Lakers. And, of course, because they set a couple more records.
The Splash Bros were at it from the start, and were relentless from then on. Klay Thompson buried five three-pointers on his way to 27 points, but as usual, Steph Curry stole the show. Coming off a bitterly disappointing 1-10 3-point performance against the Lakers, he lit it up from deep. That included some spectacular contested makes:
Curry would end up with seven threes on 13 attempts, but he also found time to get inside for some stupefying circus shots:
But the highlight of his night was unquestionably reaching the 300 mark for threes this season. It's unprecedented in NBA play, and so is the way he got there: a seven-crossover whirlwind of dribbling, then a quick-fire stepback shot with Ersan Ilyasova-who has a couple of inches on the Warriors guard-draped all over him:
He ended the night with 301st three this season, well clear of his previous record of 286, which he set last year. Curry occupies four of the top six spots on the single-season chart, but this season he's on another level entirely. As ESPN points out, it took his sharp-shooting father, Dell, seven seasons to make 300 threes. The Chef has 20 more games this season to add to his 301.
He has become so automatic that his teammates don't even have to watch the ball go in. Take Andrew Bogut, for example, who started celebrating his assist on a Curry three a second or two before Chef even took the shot:
It was a historic night for his Warriors, too. They won their 45th-straight home game, besting the '96 Bulls' NBA record and further boosting their credentials in the quest to match that team's 72 overall wins. For 56-6 Golden State, uncompromising dominance has become routine-even in a post-All Star break period that has presented its challenges. "Steph is bailing us out an awful lot," coach Steve Kerr said after this one, pointing out that they've suffered on defense and with turning the ball over recently. None of it seems to matter-they just keep winning. It's on all of us not to get too used to it.
