Before Steph Curry was an NBA superstar, multiple-time champion and one of the greatest shooters of all time, he was donning a Davidson jersey and splashing on college kids. At the 2008 Jimmy V Classic, No. 22 Davidson faced West Virginia at Madison Square Garden, and Steph Curry was a big part of why the Wildcats came out on top, 68-65. He put up 27 points and 10 assists while playing all 40 minutes, plus forced four steals and made two blocks to disrupt the Mountaineers on the other side of the ball.
Steph Curry missed a lot of shots that night, only going 9-of-27 from the field and 4-of-16 from beyond the arc. But his teammates encouraged him to keep stroking even when he erred on 12 of his first 13 attempts from deep.
“I was frustrated but my teammates kept telling me to keep shooting,” he said to the Associated Press. “I was trying to get some motion, but their defense with their long arms took that away.”
It was a good thing he listened to his teammates, because Curry went on to score 13 of Davidson’s final 15 points of the game, including back-to-back triples in a 37-second span on two of the game’s last few possessions to claw the Wildcats back from a 62-58 deficit and into a lead they would not relinquish.
“We knew he had a dry period where he couldn’t make any shots,” Davidson forward Andrew Lovedale told the AP, “but I walked up to him at a timeout and said, ‘Keep shooting. We’ll get you the ball.'”
These are Curry’s highlights from that night, providing you with the opportunity to relive – or learn for the first time – the player Curry was before he joined the Golden State Warriors and was an official Splash Bro.