MINNEAPOLIS — Steph Curry is — inarguably — one of the greatest players to ever grace a basketball court.
He owns every major 3-point shooting record, possesses a handful of championship rings and has exuded an immeasurable influence on the sport from the NBA on down to grassroots levels.
Curry is one of a select few who can claim to be in the pantheon of hoops immortals.
He could also be the next in a growing line of the game’s icons to be felled by the ascendant, brash and supremely talented 24-year-old Timberwolves superstar Anthony Edwards after the Warriors take on Minnesota in the second round.
Game 1 will be at Target Center in Minneapolis on Tuesday night (6:30 p.m., TNT).
Over the past two postseasons, Edwards has knocked an entire wing of the Hall of Fame out of the championship contention.
Kevin Durant, Nikola Jokic, LeBron James and Luka Doncic are among the basketball divinity felled by the Midwestern Kratos.
Curry, former Wolves star Jimmy Butler and Draymond Green know they have a challenge ahead of them if they do not want to see their names added to the list after surviving a grueling seven-game series with Houston.
“He’s playing with supreme confidence … he’s the same Ant who is trying to take strides with every opportunity he gets,” Curry said. “He’s going to be a tough challenge.”
Curry and coach Steve Kerr are partially to blame for his growth this season.
Kerr coached Edwards and Team USA during the 2024 Olympic Games, and Edwards has stated that Curry’s mentorship in Paris on a gold-medal run had a profound impact on the Minnesota superstar’s development.
In case Edwards needed any extra motivation to commit another act of basketball deicide, the Warriors critiqued his work ethic during the pre-draft process in 2020, when Golden State used the second overall pick on James Wiseman after the Wolves took Edwards.
Edwards later credited those comments for helping him hone his work ethic, but those words could still prove to be a source of motivation.
He has already proven he can light up the Warriors. Edwards has scored at least 40 points in five different playoff games, and scored at least 27 points in three of four matchups with Golden State this season.
In four regular-season games between the teams, three of which the Warriors won, Edwards averaged 26 points per game.
Over the Wolves’ five-game series win over James, Doncic and the Lakers, he averaged 26.8 points.
“It means a lot. I mean, we beat the best player in the world, the best player ever,” Edwards said after the Wolves clinched in Game 5.
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His first postseason matchup with the grizzled Warriors should present a far tougher challenge than a Lakers team with no identity.
Golden State can throw capable stoppers such as Butler, Moses Moody, and Gary Payton II, among others, at the high-flying wing who also made a league-high 320 3-pointers during the regular season.
Regardless of who his primary defender is, stopping Edwards will be a team effort.
“You’ve got to send multiple bodies at him, and figure out a game plan to go at him,” Curry said.
If they don’t execute, Golden State’s triumvirate of future Hall of Famers will be added to the ever-increasing number of luminaries who cannot stop Edwards’ rise to the mountaintop they once occupied.