What NBATV analyst Dennis Scott said about Stephen Curry is what most of the Denver Nuggets players were probably saying in their heads on Tuesday night.
With David Lee out for the remainder of the season due to a torn hip flexor, it was up all up to All-Star guard (at least in my book and most others) Curry to carry the extra load for the Golden State Warriors. This was the only way they were going to have a shot to beat the Denver Nuggets in the first round of the playoffs: the star power of Curry.
[Related: How the Warriors can still beat the Nuggets without Lee]
So how did he do in Game 2? He actually started the game off shooting one-of-four, showing the possibility of another off-night. Instead, he caught fire, which is kind of a funny thing to say at this point. With Curry, it seems like he’s always on fire, but shooting like he’s on fire is what he does on most nights. This is just what he does, and this is the player that he is: a shooter like no one the league may ever have seen.
Despite missing an All-Star in Lee, Curry controlled the game with a combination of deadly shooting and passing – which remains an underrated aspect of his game – to completely overwhelm a Nuggets team, who could come up with no solution to slow down Curry, nor the Warriors in general. The point guard concluded his night with a dominant stat line: 30 points on 13-of-23 shooting, five rebounds, 13 assists, three steals and one turnover.
The final score? A 131-117 Warriors victory. George Karl was dumbfounded by the results: