PHILADELPHIA — Matisse Thybulle and the Philadelphia 76ers flipped over the hourglass to at least delay Stephen Curry’s inevitable walk into NBA history.
Philadelphia accomplished the goal of preventing Curry from passing Hall of Famer Ray Allen on its homecourt as the league’s all-time leader in 3-pointers, while also nailing the larger objective of beating the meteoric Golden State Warriors, 102-93, on Sunday (PHT) at the Wells Fargo Center.
Entering the game needing 10 3-pointers to overtake Allen, Curry didn’t hit a shot from range until 1:45 remained on the clock before intermission. By the time all the seconds ticked away, Golden State sat at 12-for-48 from 3-point range, with Curry just 3-for-14.
Credit Sixers coach Doc Rivers for devising the game plan that neutralized Curry. Thybulle and other players, such as bigs Joel Embiid and Andre Drummond — who often stepped out to double the Warriors’ point guard on the perimeter — executed the strategy to perfection. Philadelphia forced Curry to toil relentlessly to steal any sliver of daylight on most shots.
A third-year veteran, Thybulle came into Sunday’s contest with just five starts under his belt, the last coming during a November 28th (PHT) loss to the Minnesota Timberwolves. Rivers moved Thybulle into the starting lineup in place of Danny Green, who had started in 16 of Philadelphia’s 19 outings entering the clash against Golden State.
Thybulle recorded two blocks on Curry 3s, the first player to send back a pair of Steph’s long-range attempts in the same game.
On Thursday (PHT), Curry nailed six 3-pointers against the Portland Trail Blazers to increase his all-time total to 2,964 3-pointers, just 10 away from passing Allen. But the Sixers cranked back the spigot of Curry 3’s to a slow drip (he finished 3-for-14 from 3-point range).
Curry still managed to reach another milestone: By stroking a trio of 3-pointers against the Sixers, Curry has now hit at least one bucket from deep in 150 consecutive regular-season games played, which ranks as the second-longest streak of 3-pointers in NBA history, behind only his own previous run of 157 consecutive games with at least one 3-pointer.
At Curry’s current pace (averaging more than five made 3s a game), he appears to be on track to either catch Allen or surpass him within the next few road games, with the Warriors facing Indiana and New York in nationally televised outings December 14th and 15th (PHT).
Curry knocked down 105 3-pointers in just his first 19 games this season to break his own NBA record (20 games) for the fewest games to reach 100 3-pointers in a season, according to Elias Sports Bureau.
Michael C. Wright is a senior writer for NBA.com. You can e-mail him here, find his archive here and follow him on Twitter.
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