Stephen Curry’s heroics in the semifinal and final of the Men’s Basketball Tournament at the 2024 Paris Olympics helped Team USA win gold for the fifth straight time. The four-time NBA champion added the only major accolade missing from his resume. His stellar performances were reminiscent of the run that made him a household name in America in 2008.
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The Warriors superstar made an appearance at the Bloomberg Power Players event in New York to discuss the direction and innovation of Under Armour. During his interview, he was asked to provide more insight into his experience in Paris, specifically the gold medal match against France. Curry replied,
“That intensity, that anxiety to get it done and for it to build up to that last three minutes for me was some storybook stuff. It still hasn’t sunk in. It’s one of those things that you did what the moment called for and thankfully all those shots went in. The silence, the crowd was special. That last one, I don’t even know how to explain it.”
The veteran guard compared the tournament’s format and non-existent margin of error to the March Madness. He said,
“It’s the best experience because in the NBA there’s such a build up in playoffs, a seven game series, and after 82 games. This is a six-game sprint and it’s basically like March Madness. One and done.”
Curry’s response explains why he was at his best in the two biggest games of Team USA’s run in Paris and was able to sink shots while his teammates struggled. While it was his maiden voyage in the Olympics, the guard had already experienced the pressure of playing in the unforgiving single-elimination playoff format.
In 2008, Curry led the lowly Davidson to an improbable Elite Eight run with one of the greatest individual displays in March Madness history. In that four-game stretch in the NCAA Tournament, he averaged 32 points and banked 5.8 three-pointers on average on 44.2 percent shooting from beyond the arc.
He brought the same energy against Serbia in the semifinal and France in the finals in the Paris Olympics. Despite struggling for most of the tournament, he averaged 30 points and converted 17 of his 27 three-point attempts in the final two games. It was a shooting performance reminiscent of his iconic March Madness run with Davidson, a perfect full-circle moment for the legendary guard.
