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Which NBA star's rise made Steph Curry realize his impact on basketball originally appeared on NBC Sports Bay Area

In 2015, former broadcaster and Warriors coach Mark Jackson said that Steph Curry was “hurting the game,” noting that kids learning to play basketball would prioritize 3-point shooting over other areas of development. 

Whether or not Curry’s impact is detrimental can be left for debate, but the existence of that impact itself is clear. The average 3-pointers made per game in the NBA has more than doubled since Curry debuted. 

On the “Mind the Game” podcast with LeBron James and Steve Nash, James asked Curry at what point did he realize his game was transcendent? 

“When [Atlanta Hawks guard] Trae Young came in the league, and that was like the first person they said was the next ‘me’,” Curry said, “even though he’s a different player.” 

Heading into the 2018 NBA Draft, Young often was compared to Curry on account of his 3-point shooting from long range and volume while playing at Oklahoma. The comparison was one of the first times that Curry realized his impact. 

“That might be the first time I thought of it or really experienced what the impact was,” Curry said. “But I got that ‘you ruined the game’ question after Mark said it. Now it’s kind of tongue-in-cheek, just because you understand there is an influence. Now it’s about how can you allow kids to hear the story about the entire journey and not just the finish point.” 

Despite the comparisons solely due to 3-point shooting, Young has not shot at the same volume as Curry in his eight years in the NBA. Young averages 7.5 3-point attempts per game to Curry’s 9.4 3-point attempts per game.  

“When he was a kid, they came to one of our games, I got to talk to him,” Curry recounted. “Next thing you know, he’s getting drafted, like ‘he’s the next [Steph Curry]’. Like no, he’s his own player.” 

Even though the comparison might not be completely accurate, Curry’s impact on the evolution of players like Young is unquestionable. 

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Making sense of the Celtics' early-season slumps, bumps and grumps originally appeared on NBC Sports Boston

The losses were not supposed to sting this much.

We were certain that, with a new-look roster and tempered expectations, the Boston Celtics’ viewing experience would be largely stress free. We were convinced fans wouldn’t feel the bumps in the road as much as they have in past seasons, where every loss in a championship-or-bust campaign felt like a stomach punch. If this new campaign was going to be a bit of a roller coaster, we were prepared with transition-year Dramamine.

We couldn’t have been more wrong. 

The losses still gnaw at you — in large part because, while the team looks different, the losses often look the same.

These Celtics can’t hold double-digit leads. Their play vacillates wildly from quarter to quarter. When their 3-point shots are not falling, they remain a tough watch, particularly given their propensity to let empty offensive possessions impact their defensive effort.

On Monday night, the Celtics should have been eager to dust themselves off after a beatdown from the championship-chasing Houston Rockets at the tail end of a five-game-in-seven-days stretch. That one was easy to chalk up as a schedule loss. But Monday was the ultimate “get right” game against a Utah Jazz team that had gotten pummeled in Charlotte the night before and was missing one of its key bigs in Walker Kessler. 

Yet, somehow, it was Boston that didn’t have enough gas in the tank in the second half Monday night, as offensive rebounds still came back to bite the Celtics.

After a defensive gem of a first half that put the Celtics ahead by double digits, Boston’s defense disappeared in the second half, the team’s effort waning as it repeatedly clanged quality 3-point looks. Keyonte George morphed into Michael Jordan for a stretch, 37-year-old Kevin Love rolled back the clocks, and Jusuf Nurkic’s putback in the final moments lifted Utah to a 105-103 triumph at TD Garden.

The Celtics’ 3-point shooting was historically bad for their volume. The C’s set an NBA record by missing 40 their 51 triples, posting the lowest 3-point percentage (21.6 percent) in league history by a team with 50-plus attempts. 

Would it make you feel any better to know the NBA tracking data suggested all those 3-point looks were pretty good? It probably won’t, right? But 50 of Boston’s 51 attempts came with 4+ feet of space from the nearest defender. The Celtics made just 2 of 21 attempts with 4 to 6 feet of space, and 9 of 29 attempts with 6+ feet of space. 

Derrick White and Payton Pritchard, who both made 3s in the opening minutes when Boston ripped off a 10-0 run, quickly reverted to their season-opening struggles. There are 178 players who qualify on the list of NBA’s 3-point percentage leaders this season. Here’s where Boston players rank:

• 178th: Payton Pritchard
• 171st: Derrick White
• 95th: Anfernee Simons
• 92nd: Jaylen Brown
• 69th: Sam Hauser

Pritchard and White were a combined 7 for 19 on Monday night, which is actually progress. Hauser improbably went 1 for 8 from distance. Simons wasn’t much better (2 for 8). Brown missed all nine 3-pointers he attempted, though he kept Boston’s offense afloat by making 13 of 19 shots inside the arc while producing a team-high 36 points. 

It seems impossible that White and Pritchard won’t eventually get on track. But as they struggle from distance to start the season, it only makes the margins that much slimmer for a Boston team with a bunch of new vulnerabilities. And, yet, if the Celtics’ defensive energy didn’t wane in the second half, they very well might have survived a historically bad shooting night.

Spare us all the chatter about the referees’ missed call on a George trip of Brown in the final minute. Yes, it should have been a whistle. No, it’s not a valid excuse for not winning this game. We don’t need a Last 2 Minute report to confirm the referee error.

Our Last 24 Minute report notes the Celtics tripped all over themselves repeatedly in the second half without aid from the Jazz or the referees. 

Brown has been fantastic, and it’s frustrating that Boston’s supporting cast hasn’t been able to help him more. It’s also annoying that, with multiple last-gasp opportunities in tight games against Philadelphia and Utah, the Celtics have been unable to get Brown a clean look at a winning shot. Brown got whistled (correctly) for a push-off before the Celtics’ final possession with 0.6 seconds to play Monday night.

Brown vented about the missed tripping call after the game but, like a good leader, eventually suggested he has to do more to help his team as this group hunts for an identity early in the new season. The truth is the supporting cast has to do more, and Brown’s efforts have been spoiled by the team’s shooting funks.

Neemias Queta will kick himself about a missed late-game free throw and his inability to box out Nurkic on Utah’s winning shot. Josh Minott can’t get in early foul trouble, which limited his floor time. Boston needs more from its bench, where every single player not named Chris Boucher was in the negative for plus/minus Monday night. 

Maybe we shouldn’t be surprised that the Celtics are experiencing these growing pains. But it all seems so preventable, which makes it harder to stomach. Boston has all the potential to outkick its tempered expectations and yet hasn’t played with anywhere near the sort of consistency that would allow that.

Chalk it up to early-season growing pains, but the Celtics’ lack of focus and discipline Monday night was inexcusable. The Rockets were simply on a different level on Saturday and the rest disadvantage didn’t help. But much of Boston’s woes in the team’s other four losses this season were largely self-inflicted.

Maybe all this team needs is White and Pritchard to get off the 3-point schneid. Maybe the Celtics just need to be mentally tougher when shots aren’t falling and lean into their obvious defensive potential instead of losing their minds. 

It’s easy to say we should have braced ourselves for these bumps given the roster changes. But there’s too much talent and potential here to be OK with the Celtics losing games the way they did Monday night.

Jaylen sounds off on late no-call in Celtics-Jazz: ‘It's unacceptable' originally appeared on NBC Sports Boston

Boston Celtics star Jaylen Brown was understandably frustrated after officials did not whistle Utah Jazz guard Keyonte George for a tripping foul in the final minute of Monday’s game at TD Garden.

With less than a minute remaining and the Celtics clinging to a one-point lead, George fell to the ground, and Brown tripped over him while trying to drive into the paint. The Celtics star lost the ball as a result of the trip, and the Jazz scored a bucket in transition to take a 103-102 lead with 44 seconds remaining.

“Y’all are going to get me fined,” Brown responded when asked about the play. “You can’t have a mistake like that as an official at that point in the game. It’s fourth quarter. It’s a minute left in the game, or less. And you completely — the whole staff blows the f—ing call. Costs us the game.

“Unacceptable. You can make mistakes at any point in the game, but right there, that wasn’t good. That wasn’t good. It’s unacceptable.

“Then they’re telling me like, ‘We didn’t see it.’ How none of you see it? You can’t trip somebody in the fourth quarter and it just be a no-call. It’s some bulls—,” Brown said.

When asked about the no-call after the game in a pool report, lead official Kevin Scott explained why no foul was called in that situation.

“During live play the crew observed George slip and fall just prior to Brown slipping on the same spot resulting in the ball becoming loose prior to any contact,” Scott told The Boston Globe’s Adam Himmelsbach.

“… The crew observed both players slip and fall prior to any contact. That’s why a foul was not called during live play.”

While that explanation likely won’t satisfy Brown or Celtics fans, that no-call wasn’t the only reason Boston this game. The Jazz outrebounded the Celtics 55 to 36 and racked up 15 offensive rebounds, the last of which was a Jusuf Nurkic putback over Neemias Queta with 0.6 seconds remaining that sealed Boston’s fate.

As for Brown, he should expect to be hearing from the league at some point after sounding off on the officials Monday night.