SAN ANTONIO — Golden State coach Steve Kerr set the tone for Friday’s 109-108 thrilling win over Victor Wembanyama and the San Antonio Spurs long before Stephen Curry stepped to the line with 6.4 seconds and sank the two most important free throws of the night.
Hours before Curry dropped in the last of his 49 points and carried his proud team across the finish line to beat the Spurs for the second time this week, he listened to Kerr give a speech about a topic that he doesn’t regularly discuss with his team.
“He rarely talks about his Chicago days,” Curry explained after the game. “And he gave some references to how they approached their team and their identity by comparisons to how a band comes together by playing your role.
“You got your lead singers, you got your bass, you got your acoustic, your electric, whatever, your drummers. You got your stage hands, you got the guy that’s plugging in the speakers.”
Kerr’s point to his team was the same one Curry believes had been instilled in his coach when Kerr was still playing with Michael Jordan and the Bulls almost three decades earlier.
Everybody has a role they have to fill. Curry knows what role he plays for the Warriors; he’s the leader, the singer, the person who makes it all go and he played it to near perfection over these last two games in San Antonio.
In the Warriors’ biggest wins of the season, Curry scored a combined 95 points over the last two games, helping a team that appeared to be breaking apart after Tuesday’s blowout loss to the Oklahoma City Thunder and putting them back together again.
If the Warriors (8-6) go on to have the success they still hope to have this season, they will look back to these two games deep in the heart of Texas as an important early turning point. Curry pointed to Kerr’s speech and his reference to the all-time Bulls teams of the late 1990s as an important lesson before Friday’s game.
“He said he was just above plugging-in-the-speaker guy,” Curry said of Kerr. “But it speaks to like, it all matters, all of that, when a band’s going on tour. And I think Phil Jackson instilled that in him, and he used that as a reference for how we needed to play, how we needed to approach our identity.
“It’s going to take a long time to get through this year in terms of doing that, but it’s great to have a reference.”
Curry is at his best when he knows something is on the line, when he has his own reference point. He’s competitive, driven and wants to do everything he possibly can to win. That’s why it should come as no surprise that another record chase added a little extra fuel to his fire on Friday night.
After scoring 46 points in Wednesday’s win, Curry was reminded by NBC Sports’ Bay Area announcer Bob Fitzgerald that he was just a game behind Jordan for the most regular-season games scoring 40 points or more by a 30-year-old or older player. Jordan and now Curry have each achieved the mark 44 times.
Curry said he was “very aware” of the record, because of course he was. So much so that when he crossed the 40-point threshold for the second straight game to tie the record, he threw up a “2” and “3” in the air with his hands to honor Jordan.
“I did it backward, though,” Curry said. “That’s the second time I’ve done that. But I was aware of it for sure. I didn’t know about it, one away, until last game … that’s pretty cool from an individual accomplishment, perspective, just to be in that type of company.
“Longevity is something I pride myself on, so that was pretty cool.”
What’s cool for the Warriors is how lucky they know they all are to continue riding Curry’s coattails, the same way so many of the former Bulls felt about how they rode Jordan’s coattails for all those years. That’s not to say there aren’t important performances that enhanced both players’ greatness.
In Friday’s case, Draymond Green’s tough defense against Wembanyama immediately comes to mind, and something both Curry and Kerr made note of after the game.
However, when an all-time player is still playing at his peak, especially doing so against one of the game’s current and future stars, there’s an extra level of appreciation for what was witnessed. It’s something Kerr and his players don’t take for granted when Curry delivers like he has over the past two games.
“He’s not bad,” Kerr said, with a chuckle, while describing Curry. “He’s not bad. What a battle between a guy who’s been doing this for a long time and continues to amaze at 37 and a young guy (Wembanyama) over there. … That was an incredible basketball game. High-level competition.”
Kerr, who coached Curry and Team USA to a gold medal at the 2024 Paris Olympics, said he wasn’t having flashbacks to the final game between USA and France, but did say he still thinks about the photo of Wembanyama running at Curry in the final moments when Curry hit one dagger after another.
“I got to get that photo copied and put it in my house somewhere,” Kerr said.
The rivalry between Curry and Wembanyama is one of the best things the NBA has going for it right now. There is a healthy respect between the players and how they compete on the floor, but there is a sense of pride in Curry for how he keeps coming out on top when it matters most. He enjoyed Wembanyama trying to fire up the crowd before those final free throws. It gave Curry that extra competitive jolt he needed.
“I’m aware of everything,” Curry said. “It’s pretty fun. I like the free throws at the end of the game. You’ve got to find something to take the nerves out. For me, that’s just embracing the moment, smiling, having a good time — especially with the fanatics they got up there in the stands right behind the basket, I kind of wanted to acknowledge it and not let it surprise me, so I played into it.
“Thankfully, I made ’em.”
Of course he did.
Curry knows his teammates follow his example every night. He knows he’s at the front of the band, the performer with the microphone in his hand each time they hit the stage. He knows he wants to put on a good show — a fact that was evident again on Friday as he shimmied and skipped up and down the floor after hitting an array of big shots.
So what kind of lead singer would he ideally like to be?
“It depends on the night,” he said.
What was he on Friday night?
“I don’t have a good reference for you,” he said with a smile. “I was Hayley Williams in Paramore tonight.”
As usual, it was Curry who lived up to the big stage and enjoyed the moment.
