On this day five years ago, Steph Curry cooked up something special.
The Golden State Warriors point guard scored 51 points in a 128-114 home victory over the Dallas Mavericks, including a 26-point third quarter.
Curry went 16-of-26 from the field, 9-of-11 from the free-throw line and sank 10-of-16 attempts from beyond the arc to generate his season-high 51. He added 4 assists and 4 rebounds to the cause as well.
He was so hot from deep that his 10 triples made Curry only the second player in NBA history to make 10 or more three-pointers in more than one game, joining J.R. Smith to share that title.
The Warriors needed every bit of Curry’s performance as they started the game off terribly. Golden State allowed a season-high 42 points to the Mavericks in the first quarter and fall behind by as many as 22 in the opening half. The team then went on a 15-2 run to start the second, and Curry’s third-quarter explosion was instrumental in finishing the comeback.
“We were just sticking to the program, we didn’t want to get too down on ourselves,” Curry said after the game. “We leaned on our crowd in the second half … Just being aggressive, that’s all we do. The shots are going to fall. As long as we got defensive stops, we kept ourselves in the game and we have enough talent on this team to turn the tide.”
The Spin on Steph Curry
Curry continued as one of the best players in the NBA during the 2014-15 campaign, averaging 23.8 points per contest, shooting 91.4 percent from the free-throw line and posting a 44.3 percent mark from beyond the arc. His performance earned him a second-straight invite to the All-Star Game.
The 26-year-old led the Warriors to a 67-15 regular season record, good for the top spot in the Pacific Division and Western Conference. The team would go on to defeat the New Orleans Pelicans, Memphis Grizzlies and Houston Rockets to win the Western Conference and a trip to the NBA Finals. After going down 2-1 to the Cleveland Cavaliers in the NBA Finals, Golden State won three straight to win the series and the franchise’s first championship since 1975.
