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NBA FINALS: CAVALIERS v WARRIORSJune 5, 2015Stephen CurryOAKLAND, CALIFORNIA: Practice Day Q. From what you could tell in this game, Steph, what was the difference how the Cavs played with and without Kyrie? STEPHEN CURRY: It was such a short kind of window in that overtime that they played without him, we didn't really get a good feel of adjustments they would make. We were probably going to prepare for Game 2 as if he's going to play until we hear otherwise. Then we obviously have some film that we can study from their last series. In three games, I think, they played without him. So I think we'll be prepared either way. But you have to go into the next 24 hours as if he's going to play and be healthy enough to give them something. So we'll see how that goes. Q. Did you notice the injury? Did you notice when he got hurt and started hobbling around? STEPHEN CURRY: I missed the whole thing. I was actually on the bottom of the play coming around chasing J.R., and I got hit with a screen. When he fell, he actually threw it to my man who was open, and I didn't see him walk off or anything. Obviously saw him walk to the locker room, but after that, that was about it. Q. We heard you get pretty emotional when you were talking about your dad and following his footsteps during your MVP speech. I'm wondering what it's been like to share this experience now through the playoffs with him? What would it mean for you to share a championship with him? STEPHEN CURRY: It would mean everything. Obviously basketball has been great to my family. He had a great 16‑year career but never got past the second round of the playoffs. That alone kind of speaks volumes to me of how hard it is to get to this point let alone win a championship. So for him to be able to come out to the Bay from NorthCarolina and be at pretty much every playoff game, home or away, and enjoy the whole experience with me means a lot. So I was just kind of joking, he's been me and my wife's roommate for the last month and a half, just tagging along.  It's special because like I talked about it in my speech, and every time I'm asked about it, he's the example for me of how to be a true professional, and he should be able to enjoy this as much as I am. Q. I know The Finals and the championship is the ultimate, but is there a sense that if you win it, you want to beat the best? And in saying that, do you hope that Kyrie is able to play? STEPHEN CURRY: You always want to, whatever challenge is in front of you, be able to conquer it. You can't help what happens along the way, and you hate to see a guy have to battle through injury. Because I've been through the same thing, and obviously the timing of it is not great. But our job is to go out and play, and compete every night. It's not to say that whoever steps up in his absence, if he can't play whether it's Dellavedova, whether it's Mike Miller, whoever is going to play those minutes, they're going to come in and try to win the game as well and impact the game. So we can't assume that Kyrie plays or doesn't play that it's going to be a cakewalk for us to get a championship. It's still going to be a challenge. It's still going to be tough. We have to control what we control and do what we do. Q. You've hit 12 straight corner three‑pointers from the left side? STEPHEN CURRY: You jinxed me already. That's a death wish for Game 2 (laughing). Q. I apologize for the number. STEPHEN CURRY: I need to know where you're sitting at in Game 2. I'll point at you if I miss it. Q. Can I ask you what makes that spot special for you? Also, did you notice what they were doing to try to keep you off the arc in Game 1? STEPHEN CURRY: I have no idea what that spot‑‑ what's different about it. I have the same confidence when I rise up no matter where I am on the floor. The corner three is the easier of the three‑point shots because it is a few inches closer, but it's kind of a different angle. Most of the threes I get from that point are from a couple of passes around the arc, and I'm either wide open or I'm in a good rhythm, so maybe that helps. That's my best way of explaining that. Teams that try to take me and Klay off the three‑point line all sorts of different ways, whether it's trapping ball screens or not helping off of any situations where you normally would help off of. A guy on the wing or whatever, they kind of stay body tight and live with somebody else making a play. So we'll find ways to get our shots off through our normal offense, no matter really how they defend because we have certain counters and certain attacks that we rely on to get those shots. Q. You talked a little bit about how they attacked you on ball screens. Just curious, how much were the nerves an impact on kind of the early offensive stagnation for you guys in terms of getting the ball moving from side to side? Or was that more of the surprise of how they were attacking you? STEPHEN CURRY: I mean, we had seven days off in between games. Obviously, they had eight. But it kind of was an adjustment period just to get back into the flow of a game‑like atmosphere and experience. We finally settled in. I think guys‑‑ I don't want to use the word nervous, but we were just so excited to be finally playing that we might have been in a little bit of a rush, or your bodies might be moving a little slower than your minds are. So thankfully we settled in, like I said, and I think Game 2 in the beginning we'll be a lot more composed and a lot more ready for that moment as we try to have a better start to our game on Game 2. Q. I don't want to jinx you on the left corner thing, but do shooters develop a hot spot? Will you ride a hot spot as long as you possibly can, and do those fluctuate over periods of time? STEPHEN CURRY: Personally I don't think about that. You don't know how you're going to get ‑‑ I mean, unless you're a heavy iso guy that you can get to a certain spot on the court and really force that situation to happen, in our offense it doesn't really work out that way. You can't really say, all right, I'm going to come down, come off a down screen and get to left wing because I've been making them from there recently. It's just about having confidence no matter where you are on the floor to get shots in our rhythm and in our offense and knock them down. Q. Steph, LeBron a couple days ago called you one of the greatest ball handlers in the history of the league. Do you agree with that? Can you talk about how you evolved, what you worked on, how long you worked, what you looked at, and who you admired and compared and tried to pattern yourself after while you came up? STEPHEN CURRY: That's obviously a great compliment and I appreciate it. I mean, that's a big part of my game in how I'm able to get space. I'm not the fastest guy, not the most athletic or explosive, so I need to be able to have change of speed, change of direction, control the ball to create space and get into a jumper or get into the lane or whatever. So I've developed it every year since I've been in the league. Even before in college I was a shooting guard mostly in college, so I didn't really have to handle as much. So it's kind of developed in the last five or six years. I've done some things in the off‑season to kind of hone in on the skills, whether it's the drills that I work on with these guys in NorthCarolina that I work out with every summer where we do some kind of sensory and neurological drills where you kind of overload everything‑‑ or overload everything on your senses but where the ball is so that you can always know that you have it on a string and you can be able to visualize yourself on the court and what you have to take in as a point guard‑‑ who is open, who is not, what lanes to attack. But the most consistent thing is I've got the ball under control and I can get to where I want to go when I make that decision. That is the best way I can explain it. It's kind of a fun workout that we do, and it's helped me a lot to really develop my ball skills to where they are. Q. Having more in previous years but in this series already you've been defending players off the ball. How does your mentality change when you're guarding somebody who is bigger and largely playing off the ball? STEPHEN CURRY: You've got to just be locked in even more than when you're on the ball because you never know when your time's coming and whether it's coming to a read on helping or staying attached to your man. When you're on the ball, you're locked in. I've got to stay in front of this guy in between him and the basket. When you're off the ball, there are more decisions that you have to make. So you've got to be locked in. You can't have any slipups. Playing angles and when you're closing out, being able to kind of read the situation before it happens so that you're always one step ahead. Whether it's a bigger guy or not, you've just got to be physical and put up a stand wherever you need to on the floor and be able to box out as well because those guys usually like to crash the glass, and you've got to be able to help your bigs out in that situation. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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