Tuesdays Gamethread: Westbrook vs Marcus Smart

[cpower]

Clyde just now: "Even at 70 yrs old, I'm not letting Curry get up 10 threes. He might have 20 two's, but I'm forcing him off that line".

See NBA, it's just that easy.

he might have five 4 point plays

[jamesnamida]

lol steph with 23 mins and 34 points.
8 threes....
too bad he missed some in the 1st quarter that he shouldve made/ taken a easier 3.
no way he will play in the 4th to break 12 threes. oh well, another day.

[3Diamantidis]

Curry being curry at the end of the 3rd

[Sleep]

Another fourth quarter chilling for Curry. They make it look so easy. Blowing teams out by 30.

Curry should be the first unanimous MVP ever.

[BirdIsDaKing]

can we please just fastforward to the western conference finals?

[Aintnohater]

Stat of the Day: Curry has more three pointers this season made than Magic Johnson does in his entire Career.

[Sleep]

Stat of the Day: Curry has more three pointers this season made than Magic Johnson does in his entire Career.

He's been truly unreal this season. MVP and no one would be angry if he got most improved. Still got some games left too.

[Vee-Rex]

Clyde just now: "Even at 70 yrs old, I'm not letting Curry get up 10 threes. He might have 20 two's, but I'm forcing him off that line".

See NBA, it's just that easy.

I'm feeling Clyde. I'd do the same. Give Curry NO space even for dribbling. Testicles to testicles. It's not too different from how Delly guards him at times. Even with the PnR, it gets uncomfortably difficult to get around a screen if you don't have much space.

Sure, Curry will score a bunch. He'll get around you and might be able to create space for some 3's. Other times he'll drive hard to the rim. But staying glued to Curry isn't impossible because he's not some super speedy athletic freak and by the end of the game Curry will have taken enough steps to travel to the moon and back.

It's messed up that a desperate strategy would come into place, but that's how it goes. Wear him down as much as possible on both ends of the court.

[Aintnohater]

Stat of the Day: Curry has more three pointers this season made than Magic Johnson does in his entire Career.

Stat 2: He has more games of 8+ threes in a game this season* than Ray Allen and Reggie Miller's careers. Combined.



*13 times. Averaging 65% from three in those games. ~Equivalent to 90% if they were 2's.

wow im speechless by this lol thats insane

[NBAfan3024]

awesome from steph

[Vee-Rex]

Clyde just now: "Even at 70 yrs old, I'm not letting Curry get up 10 threes. He might have 20 two's, but I'm forcing him off that line".

See NBA, it's just that easy.

I'm feeling Clyde. I'd do the same. Give Curry NO space even for dribbling. Testicles to testicles. It's not too different from how Delly guards him at times. Even with the PnR, it gets uncomfortably difficult to get around a screen if you don't have much space.

Sure, Curry will score a bunch. He'll get around you and might be able to create space for some 3's. Other times he'll drive hard to the rim. But staying glued to Curry isn't impossible because he's not some super speedy athletic freak and by the end of the game Curry will have taken enough steps to travel to the moon and back.

It's messed up that a desperate strategy would come into place, but that's how it goes. Wear him down as much as possible on both ends of the court.

My point is that this a tactic that has been attempted and foiled. Even with Delly (a super aggressive player coming in as rested as can be), it only took him a game in a half to figure out their tactics and start to break it down. He averaged 28/5/6 on 50/48/86 the last 4 games of the Finals (>5 made threes a game). And frankly that was with them overloading on him and leaving Iggy wide open. There's nothing Clyde's going to say that hasn't been thought up and attempted. It's why it was so funny listening to him go through that shpiel in the first quarter, only to essentially say, "I don't know what you can do" by the 3rd quarter.

Truly, the best way to try to stop Steph Curry is to be Kawhi Leonard. That's the player who is going to come closest.

Kawhi stands no chance in stopping Curry.

As for Delly - he ran out of gas and he's a sloppy/clumsy defender anyway. At the same time, the Cavs were not running Curry around on the other end of the floor. Of course, Kyrie being injured really hurt their ability to do it. However, as it stands, a lineup of:

Kyrie
Jr
LeBron
Love
Thompson

could potentially (meaning it's not guaranteed) pose problems for Curry if utilized properly. Curry does not guard Kyrie (they always put Klay on him, and if they don't, Kyrie can just attack non-stop), and if he tries to guard JR I'd run JR off 20 screens every possession. They will not put him on LeBron for fear of foul trouble, and definitely not Love or Thompson.

Run him on BOTH ends of the court and throw multiple defenders in his grill. I have yet to see a team establish Curry Rules. I only suggest this because I'm in complete agreement that there's nothing you can do schematically. He's too talented to guard one-on-one and too talented to double team.

Essentially I'd be giving him an easier way to the rim but if you've ever played basketball that will drain the **** out of your stamina. Dude is still human despite the inhuman year he's having.