There have definitely been moments this season in which Golden State Warriors guard Stephen Curry has seemingly been unsure how to adapt to the presence of Kevin Durant in the lineup. It turns out Durant noticed too.
The former Oklahoma City star told ESPN’s Chris Haynes that, over a period of several weeks, he privately told Curry to just be himself and he would find a way to follow.
“I just said to him, ‘Don’t worry about me,'” Durant said. “I said, ‘Just play your game. I’ll figure it out. I’ll figure it out around you. You’re the engine of this team, and I know that. I’m not trying to come over and feel like everything just revolves around me. Just do you, man. I’m going to play around you. I’ve played this game long enough. I know how to score. I know how to find the ball. Just go out there and play your game.’ And that’s what he’s been doing.”
For Curry’s part, he appreciated that Durant wanted to go and do that when he didn’t really have to.
“For lack of a better term, he said I need to get in my bag and be aggressive,” Curry said. “That back-and-forth dialogue is where you build chemistry and camaraderie to get through the season. You understand what each other needs to hear. It was not a come-to-Jesus meeting; it’s just being locked in, observing what’s going on and having each other’s back. You need that encouragement along the way.
“It didn’t hurt. I feel like I’m self-motivated enough to figure it out; but along the way, if you get in your own head, you need an outside perspective of what other people see, especially a guy that invests a lot in the game, just like I do. It didn’t hurt, for sure. That’s what we’re going to need going forward, as well.”
After a December in which he averaged 20.9 points per game and shot 37.5 percent from deep – modest numbers by his standards – Curry’s January has seen those numbers tick up to 27.8 and 43.1 percent, respectively. It seemed to culminate in an awesome Saturday night performance that saw him make nine threes, including this one. Perhaps Durant’s intervention helped out there, and that adaptability is a big reason why this Golden State experiment is working.
