“You can see the look in his eyes”

SAN FRANCISCO – It is that time of the year. 

When the regular season draws to a close and wins and losses become the difference between home court advantage and a trip to the dreaded play-in tournament, Steph Curry gets that “look.”  

“You can see the look in his eyes,” Draymond Green said. “Some of those shots he takes, he’s just trying to wait for everybody to clear out so he can get a shot off. I can see it from a mile away.”

That “look” was on full display during his 36-point night at Chase Center during the Warriors’ 118-104 victory over the Nuggets on Friday night, a victory that gave the Warriors five wins in a row. 

That show of shooting brilliance came on the heels of Thursday’s 37-point outburst in Los Angeles, and a 52-point masterpiece in Memphis on Tuesday. 

That gave him an average of 42 points per game in April, compared to just 23 PPG (in 12 games) in March, and well above his 24.8 points per game on the season. 

This kind of hike in springtime production – albeit not quite to this degree – is nothing new for Curry. 

It is the product of an intensity that comes out during springtime, a seriousness that emerges from the point guard. It manifests itself in phone calls with teammates, where Curry obsesses over the smallest detail and tactic in search of any slight advantage he can find.

“It’s obviously really hard to have a sustained level of intensity for 82 games,” Curry said. “But the sense of urgency down the stretch, the feeling where you are in the standings matters, every game matters, the idea the chess match of how do we win this particular game because a little bit more important.”