Representing Team USA at the Olympics is unlike any other experience -- and Steph Curry’s pregame nerves Sunday proved that point.
Despite having won his first NBA championship nearly 10 years ago and establishing himself as the league’s best shooters of all time along the way, the 36-year-old made his Olympics debut in Team USA’s 107-84 win over Serbia.
The furthest thing from a stranger to the big stage, the Warriors superstar felt plenty of pregame butterflies ahead of America’s first game at the 2024 Paris Olympics.
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"I think I had a lot of nerves up until the national anthem," Curry told the San Francisco Chronicle's Ron Kroichick in Lille, France. "It's a really cool environment in there.
“Obviously it was sold out to the nosebleeds and the energy was great. Putting on this jersey at this level, I've been looking forward to it for a very long time."
Curry passed up on the 2016 Olympics in Rio de Janeiro after a strenuous 2015-16 NBA season, in which the Warriors fell just shy of consecutive league championships after a Game 7 loss to the Cleveland Cavaliers.
And yet, despite waiting almost an entire career for his first chance at the Olympics, Curry isn’t a stranger to USA Basketball, having won gold medals at the 2010 World Championships and the 2014 World Cup.
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On Sunday, leveraging all of his international experience, Curry finished with 11 points on 4-of-8 shooting, including 3 of 7 attempts behind the 3-point line. Team USA’s win also included a big wake-up call for Curry, coach Steve Kerr and Co. after they fell behind Serbia 10-2 early in the game.
“It’s human nature to kind of let your imagination get the best of you,” Curry told Kroichickand revealed that Kerr had criticized him during the timeout for letting a Serbian player score on a back cut. “You’re thinking, ‘Oh, we can’t lose this game.’ So that timeout was probably the moment when it’s like, ‘We’re here, settle in, get adjusted to the environment.’
“Thankfully, I hit that shot coming out of the timeout, and then we were off to the races.”
With nerves potentially out of the way, Team USA, like it has in other tournaments, can benefit from Curry as it chases its fifth consecutive gold medal at the Summer Games.