Nets guard Seth Curry offered a reminder of how valuable he can be when he returned Friday after missing three games with a sore left ankle, writes Brian Lewis of The New York Post. Beyond his 27-point outburst, Curry provided a floor spacer who can make teams pay for throwing double- and triple-teams at Kevin Durant.
“It was huge … he had 27, 9-for-14, efficient from all angles on the floor,” Durant said. “We needed that, and it was good to see him back out there. Missed a few games with that ankle, but I’m glad it’s getting better and he’s able to come out here and play. And we needed all those points.”
Curry has the best career three-point shooting percentage among active players, so it’s easy to understand why the Nets targeted him in the trade that sent James Harden to Philadelphia. They lead the NBA in both offensive rating and effective field-goal percentage in the games that Curry has played, and he will be counted on to provide scoring with Kyrie Irving only able to play in three more games.
Curry, who will be eligible for an extension this summer, said the ankle pain began when he was still with the Sixers, but he believes he can play through it.
“I was dealing with it probably a month before the trade. It’s been a while. It’s something I’m just going to have to manage and deal with until the offseason,” he said. “It’s not something that’s going to go away. So as long as it’s not getting worse, I should be good.”
Since being traded to the Nets, Curry is averaging 16.8 points, 3.2 rebounds, 3.1 assists and 1.1 steals while shooting 47.6% from three-point range.
There’s more from Brooklyn:
- The Nets were able to keep Bruce Brown on a $4.7M qualifying offer last offseason, but his price may be a lot higher this summer, Lewis suggests in a separate story. Brown has upped his game since the Harden trade, and while some of the improvement has come from more minutes and a revamped role, part of it is related to attitude. “Early in the season, it was all mental for me,” Brown said. “I was trying to fit in the role that I had last year, and it wasn’t working. So I got kind of frustrated, and that’s when I kind of got out of the rotation. Then I went to ‘Smoke’ [assistant coach Royal Ivey], and I was like, ‘Bruh, I want to get better.’ So we got to work on something different. I started working on a little bit of guard stuff, just getting back to my game, the way I played my whole life, and it started to work.”
- Andre Drummond, another addition in the Sixers trade, has found the game comes a lot easier playing alongside Durant and Irving, Lewis states in the same piece. Drummond is putting up his best numbers of the season, averaging 14.3 points and 10.5 rebounds in his last six games. “For me, it’s a lot of fun for two reasons: One, I’m playing with two of the best players in the world,” he said, “and secondly, when they do miss, there’s nobody down there because everybody’s so worried about contesting their shots. So when they do miss, it’s a walk in the park for me to go get the rebounds.”
- Kessler Edwards is hoping to bounce back after hitting the “rookie wall” at midseason, Lewis adds. Edwards fell out of the rotation following 18 straight starts in January and February, but he scored 26 total points in back-to-back games this week.
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