SAN FRANCISCO -- For just over four months, Warriors guard Steph Curry has walked into Chase Center with no plans to finish the evening playing sanctioned basketball.
Now, hours before his return from a broken left hand, he expressed joy about getting back into the fold.
"I'm excited," he told reporters following Thursday's shootaround. "Coming into this year, I was excited to compete and see what the season held in terms of our transition as an organization."
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In his return, Curry, who broke his hand on Oct. 30, says he'll be on a restriction of "about 24 to 28 minutes" with the preference of playing towards the ends quarters.
Thursday's slated arrival comes four days after Curry's initial target date of March 1. But after consultation with team doctors, Curry was sent to scrimmage with Golden State's G League affiliate in Santa Cruz on Monday. While Curry expressed frustration with the date change, he said he content with the process.
"I mean, it sucks when you get so close and you have your mindset on what return date it is," he said. "Obviously, I understood the extra four days and going on to Santa Cruz and playing pickup knowing we didn't have enough bodies. Nobody likes to wait more than they have to. I'm not the most patient guy, but in terms of understanding, making sure everybody in the organization, the voices that matter were in alignment."
As for playing through the injury, Curry, who admitted he's still adjusting to playing through nerve damage in his hand, said he wasn't worried about re-injury.
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“I’ve been clear that it’ll be awhile that, comparing the left [hand] to the right, it’ll feel normal," he said. "But that’s the reality of it and at this point, I can’t reinjure it unless something freakish happens.”
"Hopefully, there aren't any thoughts and I get to play my game the way I see it and make plays without having thoughts or hesitation," he added.
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On Wednesday, Warriors coach Steve Kerr said he wasn't sure whether Curry would participate in back-to-backs this season. A day later, while Curry admitted to a minutes' restriction, he was more bullish about the prospect of sitting out games.
"We had talks about back-to-backs and whether that's in play or not," he said. "But the rest of it is when I come back I want to be all the way back and not have that 'Now you see, now you don't,' type of vibe so that's why I had all these checkpoints to get through to get cleared to play. So I want to be out there every night and finish the game strong."