This Week in Playoff Mode: Steph Curry isn’t done writing his legacy

Steph Curry delivered for the Warriors in historic fashion, setting the stage for an epic second-round showdown with LeBron James and the Lakers.

The story of all-time greats is told through moments. Statistics, even one such as Steph Curry being the only player to ever score 50 points in a Game 7, can only do so much to add to the lore of a legend.

So, it should come as no surprise that within minutes of the Warriors’ win on Sunday, The Athletic ran a story about “the greatest speech” of Curry’s career. He delivered it a day before the Warriors’ win-or-go-home showdown against the Kings in Sacramento. Curry, on the heels of his team losing Game 6 at home, was “disgusted,” “fed up” and “couldn’t sleep.” The speech, according to Marcus Thompson II and Shams Charania, began with Curry saying, “I don’t even talk a lot, but I’ve got something to say.”

Goosebumps yet? The NBA formula is an easy one to understand: To achieve great things, greatness is required. Putting that greatness into context is part of the fun, but the real thrill is watching not knowing when greatness may emerge. Steph’s speech guaranteed nothing. It was a two-possession game with 14 seconds left in the third quarter, and it’s hard to draw a line between Steph’s rousing words 24 hours prior to tip and the Warriors out-scoring the Kings 14-2 over the next five minutes — even if it’s easy (even compelling) to explain the “speech + 50 points = win” formula.

“This is a Game 7 I will forever remember as the Steph Curry game,” teammate Klay Thompson said.

Greatness could have come from De’Aaron Fox, who played the last three games of this seven-game series with a fractured finger on his shooting hand. Overcome that and take down the defending champs? That’s a Greatness story, too. Might we have read stories about Fox fighting through pain and willing his team to victory if the Kings had won? It’s a good bet.

But that’s not what happened here. When all of the context is considered, a Kings win would have been surprising. Steph’s speech is a news story because it’s surprising. Contrary to the formula, I’d argue that what truly sets Game 7 apart is not the surprising bits, but how unsurprising Steph Curry’s performance was.

Steph Curry carried the Warriors by doing what he’s always done

Steph’s 50-point game in the Warriors’ 120-100 win over the Kings Sunday was predictable like the climax scene of a John Wick movie, in which Wick is pushed into the proverbial corner and left with no recourse other than to storm a warehouse and unload several clips of ammunition into the bodies of his enemies. Curry on Sunday walked into Golden 1 Center and took 38 shots in 38 minutes. It’s the most shots he’s taken in a playoff game in his career, and it’s what a fractured, old and worn Warriors team needed him to do. In the end, the difference between the Warriors and the Kings is that the Warriors had Baba Yaga.

“He’s Steph Curry,” Warriors coach Steve Kerr said. “His approach to these games is that he is going to go down swinging.”

Game 7 was unsurprising because Steph Curry has defined his career through these kinds of stories. He’s a capital-S Superstar because he does not shrink in these moments. In fact, you can pencil in a big night from Steph going in. For stars across the league and still in these playoffs — like Nikola Jokic, Joel Embiid, Chris Paul and Jayson Tatum — there’s a question of whether they can thrive in a similar way, every time. There’s no question that Steph will step up. Steph is inevitable. It’s not if, but when.

There’s only one other player in the NBA whose legacy has been defined by carrying his team in desperate times en route to a championship, and Steph Curry’s Warriors just so happen to be facing him in the next round.

LeBron James and the Lakers await. To stretch the John Wick metaphor further, this feels like the unreleased final chapter. The series everything has been building to. Not because these two rivals haven’t met in the Finals on four occasions, but because they have. The highest peaks of their careers overlapped and then faded into the historical record. Now, what do they have left?

Both of their teams limped into the playoffs, then dispatched their higher-seeded, younger nemesis. During the first round, Steph and LeBron flashed in moments of competitive fire like the Kings or Grizzlies killed their dog, and now they meet again. Each one is a hurdle in the way of the other legend who always seems to get over the hump. Four rings vs. four rings.

How much each of their legacies will be defined by this series is an open question. It could ultimately be immaterial if the winner of Warriors-Lakers loses in a future round. But if the winner ends up getting that fifth ring, well, then this series becomes another moment. An easy-to-tell story of Superstar A defeating Superstar B on his way to breaking the championship tie.

We don’t know how much is truly at stake. Could be nothing. The Nuggets, Suns or whatever team comes out of the East could be too good. This unknown is the obvious thrill of the NBA playoffs. The anticipation — and what sets this series apart — lies in the fact that we know Steph and LeBron are about to put on a show.

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