You thought Klay Thompson’s scintillating 41-point, season-sustaining, pulse-pounding playoff game against Oklahoma City in May 2016 was a performance for the ages?
Well it was. He canned 11 three-pointers and scored 19 points in the fourth quarter as the Warriors extended their postseason with a 108-101 victory.
You just didn’t know the half of it.
Recently, in a lengthy and revealing SLAM magazine story, Thompson acknowledged that his explosive performance that night was dedicated to his friend’s recently deceased dog.
I’m not crying. I just got something in my eye.
A few days before that fateful contest, one of Thompson’s high school buddies, Philippe Zarif, suffered a heart-rending turn of events, according to SLAM. Zarif’s 13-year-old boxer Tyson passed away without warning. The morning of Game 6, with the Warriors in a tenuous position trailing 3 games to 2, Thompson texted his friend:
“This one’s for Tyson.”
It wasn’t a surprising gesture if you know Thompson and his love for his English bulldog Rocco.
“Phil treated that dog like a son,” Thompson said, according to SLAM. “I know loved ones come in different capacities, whether it’s human or animal, so he was really in my thoughts.”
“That Klay even reached out to me about it was epic,” Zarif told the mag. “It was the biggest game of the year and he still was thinking about my loss. That’s Klay.”
