Steph offers early review of Warriors' play in training camp

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The Warriors are one of the NBA's most intriguing teams heading into the 2021-22 NBA season.

Steph Curry, 33, proved last season that he still is solidly in the middle of his prime, leading the league in scoring at 32 points per game. Golden State added veterans Andre Iguodala, Otto Porter Jr. and Nemanja Bjelica in the offseason, and drafted Jonathan Kuminga and Moses Moody in the first round of the 2021 NBA Draft.

Of course, most of the intrigue revolves around Klay Thompson, who is set to return at some point after missing two straight seasons with a torn ACL and torn Achilles.

Thompson's return date isn't yet known, but based on what Curry has seen from the Warriors early on in training camp, the two-time MVP is confident they can hold things down until his Splash Brother returns and finds his groove.

What I’ve seen early in camp is there’s a commitment to just our style, and moving the ball, that offense by committee where everybody’s cutting, and screening for each other,” Curry told The Athletic's David Aldridge and Marcus Thompson. “We obviously know that you get scouted, and fourth quarters come, things kind of slow down, you have to get to your bread and butter offense. But we have a lot of shooting, that we necessarily didn’t have the last couple of years.

"Being able to create space and create room on the floor with that shooting, I feel like will help us this year a lot offensively. Jordan Poole has just been a superstar in terms of taking advantage of his opportunity and continuing to get better, the work he puts in, and obviously he’s shown that early. He has a prime opportunity to be a sparkplug for us all year long.

“I think just, what Warriors basketball is and how you’ve seen us play for years on in, it’ll be another evolution of that," Curry continued. "And hopefully, the spacing and the shooting that we have will open up a lot more opportunities and options across the board. And then when Klay gets back, it’s just a matter of figuring out what our rotation is, and understanding that he’s going to take us to another level. We’ve almost got like three seasons in one. It’s like the anticipation for Klay coming back; whenever he does come back, that first, maybe, month or six weeks, where you figure out what he looks like and getting his legs underneath him, and then you have the playoff push. We’re kind of breaking it up into those segments, and hopefully we take care of our business.”

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After two straight seasons watching the playoffs from home, Curry and the Warriors plan to vault back into NBA title contention this season.

How they hold down the fort while Thompson finishes his rehab and how they play once the sharpshooter is fully re-integrated into the lineup will determine where they fall in the Western Conference pecking order.

But this Warriors team is much deeper than last year's model that was bounced from the play-in tournament via back-to-back losses to the Los Angeles Lakers and Memphis Grizzlies.

It's early, very, early, but Curry has liked what he has seen from the newest iteration of the Warriors.

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