Stephen Curry puts on another show in one of last Toronto appearances

Hopefully there will be several more Steph Curry games in Toronto before the all-time great calls it quits, but the clock is ticking on Canadian appearances by an all-time Raptors foil.

Curry was in town for a Sunday matinee, just the 11th time his many fans have been able to see him here in the regular season (along with three in the NBA Finals). As always, they lined up outside the gates long before the game began and showed up in droves for his warmup, which features Curry launching shots from unfathomable distances. Later, they cheered on every big play he made. It felt like half the people in attendance were backing Curry and not the hometown Raptors, with many even groaning when he was called for an offensive foul while trying to create space for a potential game-winner late in regulation.

This was a bit of a homecoming for Curry, whose wife is from Toronto. Curry had averaged 29 points a game at Toronto over the years, more than any other player and added to that with a game-high 39. The Air Canada Centre turned Scotiabank Arena has always been a special place for him, since he spent a couple years of his youth shooting on the court and in the upstairs practice gym when his father Dell played for the Vince Carter Era Raptors. The elder Curry’s former teammates Charles Oakley and Alvin Williams were in the building Sunday, adding to the sense of familiarity.

At 38, still one of the best shooters

Though he’ll turn 38 in March, Curry remains one of the premier players in the sport. He came in averaging 28.4 points, ranked first in three-point makes and attempts and fifth in the NBA in box plus/minus. Still, he’s only in town once a year, missed four years worth of games in Toronto following the Finals and won’t play forever, which is why Sunday was such a hot ticket.

Curry hit a couple of circus shots early on, banked in a two-pointer later (while telling his bench it would go off the glass) and also wisely moved the ball to a red-hot Draymond Green, who shockingly nailed four three-pointers, many of the wide open variety thanks to Toronto’s desire to stay close to Curry, the best three-point shooter ever.

Raptors head coach Darko Rajakovic had said before the game that game-planning around Curry wasn’t easy. “Everybody is trying to find that out. I don’t see around the league that some coach has come up with a magic solution,” Rajakovic had said.

The man on the other side, Steve Kerr has the opposite perspective, having benefitted from Curry’s brilliance.

Asked pre-game what he would tell himself if he could go back a decade or so when he started coaching the Warriors, Kerr’s simple response was: “Just coach Steph Curry. Stay with that guy.”

The fans certainly have.

Raptors guard Shead did all he could to try to contain Curry, and it ended up just being enough. “Always a challenge guarding one of the greatest ever and for him to be the greatest shooter, to play this game,” Shead told Postmedia.

“Like our whole game plan was centred around him, and just how to try to contain him a little bit, you know, he’s still gonna make really big shots …it’s about just not getting down on yourself,” Shead said,

“He still had (39) tonight, but I feel like we did a good job and got him away from the shots he usually takes.”

You have to be a pretty special player when an opponent lives with giving up that many points. It took a special Scottie Barnes evening to overcome it.