	products recent interviews FastScripts archive about ASAP Sports

Our Clients:

Browse by Sport

Find us on

Subscribe to RSS

Click to go to
Asaptext.com

View our
e-Brochure

NBA WESTERN CONFERENCE FINALS: THUNDER v WARRIORS

May 16, 2016

Stephen Curry

Oakland, California: Game one

Oklahoma City 108 - Golden State 102

Q. Warriors' shots went cold in the fourth quarter. I'm wondering if you feel like that was just you guys not shooting well or if the Thunder defense did a lot to take that away from you?
STEPHEN CURRY: We got rushed a little bit and tried to go for the home run plays. Sometimes it works. When you get a feel that's not clicking, you're not getting the shots that you want, you're kind of forcing it. We need to have more composure to be able to slow it down and work those possessions, because defensively we were getting enough stops and rebounds. Then we had the opportunity, we just got out of character a little bit, but it's something we'll learn from going forward.

Q. Steve Kerr said that he thought the thing that really jumped out were your turnovers in the second half compared to OKC. Do you feel that way? I know turnovers are sometimes your bugaboo. Were you feeling like you were not being crisp enough with your passes?
STEPHEN CURRY: A couple of them were just kind of bad timing on certain reads, especially the pick-and-roll, couple dropped passes. But when you compound turnovers that may or may not happen with bad possessions and quick shots and rushed possessions, it makes it seem a lot worse.

So we've got to play aggressive. We take some chances every once in a while, but obviously we want to cut down -- only 14, but most of them in the second half down the stretch, so we want to cut down on some of those. But when we have better possessions down the stretch of the game, especially in the fourth quarter when we're in striking distance of gaining momentum and taking the lead, you've got to take advantage of those opportunities, and we didn't do that tonight.

Q. In 48 hours you've got to go back at it, so what do you and the rest of the Warriors have to do to build that psyche back up?
STEPHEN CURRY: Just watch some good film tomorrow, figure out what exactly went wrong down the stretch, things we can do better. It's a long series. Obviously it's not a good feeling losing Game 1 especially at home, and it will be a different situation for us to try to bounce back at this point in the series having a deficit. So I think it's fun to be able to have this opportunity to come back and show what we're made of, show our resiliency. It's going to be a long series, so we've got to be ready on Wednesday.

Q. We're used to seeing you guys close teams out in the fourth quarter. You said that you rushed shots and lost your composure somewhat. Why did you lose your poise? We don't see this from you, I mean, as the whole team.
STEPHEN CURRY: Sometimes those shots go in and it's a good feeling, you keep the crowd into it. But tonight that didn't happen. Like I said, when two or three possessions end up that way, you've got to change it up a little bit and grind out on the offensive end better shots, and we weren't able to do it.

Like I said, long series, we'll be able to bounce back and get back to who we are.

Q. How much better is this team defensively than what you've seen earlier this year or even in years past? Why are they better?
STEPHEN CURRY: I mean, obviously they have a pretty big lineup that they can throw out there and do a lot of switching and try to take you out of certain reads. But they didn't make too many mistakes on the defensive end, which forced us into some tough shots.

At the end of the day, when we are at our best, no matter how good a defense is, we move the ball, we move bodies, we set good screens and make defenses pay for being aggressive out on the perimeter. Tonight that wasn't us. So they're going to continue to throw whatever adjustments at us, but we have to be better at being us.

Q. In the first half when they used Kanter and Adams together, you made them pay; they had to get Kanter off the floor. That didn't happen in the second half; they were effective together. What was the difference in the two halves with their two big guys playing together?
STEPHEN CURRY: The pace slowed down, especially in the third quarter with all the fouls that we had and they got to the free-throw line. So the pace wasn't in our favor. Then we just missed shots. Like I've been saying, we got stops and pushed, and just rushed a little bit. So we need to have more patience, more composure, and we need to continue to be us.

Q. Durant and Westbrook scored over 50. What is your assessment of their play and what is your strategy with stopping them in Game 2?
STEPHEN CURRY: I thought we did a pretty good job. Besides keeping them off the free-throw line, which is something you don't want to let them get easy points and get a flow and a rhythm. But they're going to take a lot of shots. Most of the offense goes through them, so they might end up having 20-plus, but it's the way that they get it that you have to make them work. For the most part from the field we did that. We just gave them 16 points from the free-throw line and that, in turn, slowed the pace down. They got most of those in the second half, so we have to do a better job with that.

Q. It looked like you had Russell pretty well under control. I think he was 1 for 11 midway through the third quarter, and then he hit this big three near about 25 feet. From that point on it seemed like he was a different player. What changed there?
STEPHEN CURRY: When players of his caliber aren't playing well or shooting the ball well, sometimes it only takes one to go in. I have the same mentality, and you know that they're not going to stop no matter how they're playing. Like I said, he got to the free throw line too much in the third quarter. That got his flow back, and we need to make adjustments in that regard. But hopefully we can bottle up that first half and bring it back next game.

Q. Steph, it looked like you played off the ball a little bit in the fourth quarter, only six shots. Any reason in particular for that?
STEPHEN CURRY: No, just certain sets that we wanted to run and try to get different looks. Like I said, that's something we might look at tomorrow, figure out how they were defending us, and make certain adjustments going into Game 2. It's kind of hard to say right now, but we have a lot of sets where we can be versatile, on and off the ball and get open looks. So we'll figure that out.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

ASAP Sports, Inc. | T: 1.212 385 0297