Warriors’ Steph Curry, Draymond Green reflect on ‘rollercoaster’ season after Play-In loss

PHOENIX – Stephen Curry and Draymond Green won’t remember this season for what they weren’t able to accomplish. Amidst all the trophies, banners, and rings the duo has collected over their 14 years together, this season does not even scratch the surface of what they’ve been able to achieve.

Instead, what they will take away from this season, full of ups and downs and injuries, is pride. Pride in the process, in the perseverance and the hardships. Pride in making the most out of what remained from what was taken from them.

“It was a rollercoaster ride, to say the least,” Curry said post-game. “You see momentum slipping away, but there was still this underlying belief. When it comes to the Warriors, you’re always talking about championships; that’s what we’ve established as a goal. But when we had to reshape that, it’s like, okay, can we just make something out of this year to get a playoff experience and playoff berth? And that felt like the right goal, and why I forced my way to try to get back.”

This was a season of recontextualization. That’s what happens when a star like Jimmy Butler suffers a season-ending injury. With competing for a title off the table, Curry, Green, and the Warriors had to re-contextualize what they could make of this season. Could they turn a storm of injuries into a Hail Mary opportunity? Would they find a way to grasp one last moment in the spotlight? Could they reach the meaningful games Curry so desperately sought?

Some of that they achieved. Some of that they didn’t. But in their season of re-contextualization was a process of approaching these new goals with honor. Honor in the process, rather than the result.

“For us to have that moment we did in LA, the highs of that and the lows of tonight, it’s just what basketball, what sports is about. You never know what’s going to happen, but you give it everything you have.”

How this season stacks up in the Warriors’ golden run

For Green, this is just one of those seasons the Warriors have to take on the chin and keep it moving. Green said after the game that the injuries they suffered this season were unlike anything he’s ever seen before. But in his words, even that is the good that he has to take with the bad. Especially given all their successes.

“We whooped on a lot of people for a long time,” Green said in how he views this campaign in the context of their run. “But you get whooped on, you can’t put your head down. You’ve got to take the punches and move forward, you know? So we take pride in not being front-runners.”

Green has used that front-runner phrase a lot in the second half of the season. What he means by it is that he and the Warriors take pride in the fact that they aren’t the kind of team that only stays together when everything is going right. Because almost nothing went right this season.

Which takes it back to the honor the Warriors found in the process. Green and the crew were proud of the fact that they never ran from their hardships. Which is why Green takes the end of this season loss with a smile on his face.

“When we was beating everybody, I sat up here with a smile,” Green said. “When they beat us, I’m gonna sit up here with a smile.”

“I’m proud of the way we finished it,” Curry echoed. “Because it could have been very sleepy. Like, I [don’t] come back. We get blown out in the first game, and everybody kind of just goes into the summer with no real direction. It was a fun ride these last four days.”

What’s next for Steph Curry and Draymond Green?

This will be an interesting offseason for the two pillars of the Warriors’ dynasty. For Curry, the summer will be all about getting his knee right after losing two months of the season due to its instability.

“They say a lot of golf helps my game. I heard that was part of the research I did,” Curry joked. “But I don’t feel like there’s going to be any real long-term symptoms or anything.”

The two-time MVP also expressed that he doesn’t plan on next season being a farewell tour. Curry’s interested in keeping the kicks on for “multiple” years, even expressing some intrigue in a possible extension after his contract expires next season.

As for Green, his future is a little less certain. With a $27.7-million player option on the table this summer, there are a lot of different ways he and the Warriors could approach his future. There’s the potential he opts out and the Warriors re-up his deal with more money, just stretched out to save the hit on the books. Or he opts in, and the Dubs decide to salary dump his contract.

Either way, Green made it clear he’s not planning on retiring.

“I’m not retiring from basketball. I still love to play,” Green said. “I think I’m still pretty decent, but this league we’re in is an interesting one. And it’s one that you don’t really control everything. So for me, I hope I’ve done enough to still be here, because at the end of the day, if I ain’t done enough, I don’t want to be here.

“If the question is where I want to be, I think it’s pretty obvious, guys… They want me here. I’ll be right here.”

And so this is where Curry and Green’s 14th season together ends. Proud of how they weathered it, and with the hope they can keep this thing going until the wheels inevitably fall off.

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