Over the countless records in NBA history, some are more impressive than others. When it comes to the NBA’s ultimate “unbreakable” record, most would say it’s Wilt’s most minutes played in a single season with 3,882, but Hornets rookie Kon Knueppel recently offered a different answer. In a chat with Danny Emerman of the San Francisco Standard, Knueppel explained why Curry’s record for three-pointers in one season (402) is right up there with the best.
“I think the 400 3s in a season,” said Knueppel. “I view that as pretty close to unbreakable… It’s up there in NBA history. I don’t know if the total is as unbreakable, just because early in his career, he missed some games, missed some times with the ankles, but also just wasn’t shooting as many as maybe players are shooting them today.”
Curry’s greatness helped the game evolve to the point where almost every player is shooting from distance. While you might think that it’s only a matter of time before someone outdoes Curry at his own game, Anthony Edwards agrees that nobody’s built quite like him.
“I don’t think anybody wants to beat Steph’s records, man,” Edwards said. “It’s Steph Curry. I think nobody’s out here like, ‘I’m gonna go get 400 3s this year.’ Ain’t nobody thinking like that but Steph Curry.”
There are many NBA records considered to be untouchable. Wilt has many of them, including minutes in a season and most points scored in one game (100). There’s also Bill Russell’s 11 championships, a standard that has stood since 1969. In more modern times, it’s easily LeBron James’ all-time scoring record with a whopping 43,127 points to his name (and counting).
It’s hard to say where Stephen Curry’s shooting record ranks among those milestones, but it can’t be too far behind. His unanimous MVP season in 2015-16 was a truly unbelievable run that saw the Warriors star total 402 three-pointers. The only other player in the top five is James Harden, who is second on the list with 378 three-pointers in 2018-19.
For added context, that means Curry was hitting about 4.9 three-pointers per game on roughly 45.5% shooting. That’s just a ridiculous shooting pace, and Steph was making it look easy as he led the Warriors to the best record in NBA history (73-9). While the Warriors didn’t close it out with a title, that season is one of the best we’ve seen by any player, and it still ranks as his best today, with averages of 30.1 points, 5.4 rebounds, 6.7 assists, 2.1 steals, and 0.2 blocks per game on 50.4% shooting from the field and 45.4% shooting from three.
If anyone can beat Curry’s record, it’s probably Knueppel himself, and he’s already on a good pace as the fastest player in NBA history to reach 200 career three-pointers. It’ll be tough for everything to line up as it did for Curry that year, but he’s still got plenty of time to try.
