As Draymond Green and the Golden State Warriors prepared for Game 5 of the NBA Finals against the Boston Celtics, a lot of the talk at Sunday's practice was about Klay Thompson, and the ACL injury suffered three years ago.

Monday, June 13th, is not only the date of Game 5, but apparently also makes three years to the day that Thompson suffered his brutal ACL injury that ended his season. Throughout the day, multiple members of the Warriors were asked about the ‘three-year anniversary' of Thompson's injury back in the 2019 NBA Finals.

Klay Thompson and the Warriors have spent months talking about his return, how hard he's worked to get back, and how thankful they are to have him. On Sunday, however, the questions came back again.

When he initially suffered the injury, Thompson tried to return, making his two free throws. Ultimately, he was pulled from the game and was not cleared to return.

“I never had such a severe injury, so I didn't think it was that serious,” Klay Thompson said on Sunday. “I thought I might have sprained something in my knee. But you know, when you're in the championship and you're playing in front of our fans, your adrenaline is so high that you kind of disregard anything that makes sense, and running around on a torn ACL doesn't make very good sense.

“I just thought, I don't want to leave these points on the board, man. This is the Finals. I'm going to go get this 30-ball. Then on top of that, I went to the back and they did a little test and they came out with the conclusion that I should probably put some crutches on.

“Wow, what a time. Three years ago. That — wow. It just goes by fast.”

Thompson said he didn't know that Monday marks three years since the injury happened, but says he's focused on winning and not necessarily reflecting on the three-year mark.

“Maybe for a second. But when I step on that court, I want to win by any means necessary,” Thompson added. “I don't care how ugly or pretty it is. Let's just win and protect our home court. I'm not going to sing Kumbaya or anything. I just want to frigging win.”

The same question was asked of Draymond Green, but he did not want to go back and relive his memories of Thompson's injury. He had a back and forth with the reporter who posed the question.

“It's unnecessary,” Draymond Green said when asked for his memories of that night. “We're here in this moment. There's no need to talk about something that's unfortunate that happened three years ago. We're here in this moment. We're going to stay in this moment. We're going to think positive thoughts and we're going to move forward.

“My point was everything he's overcome since then,” the reporter explained.

“Yeah, it's been great to see where he is and the level that he's back playing at,” Green responded. “But there's no need for us to talk about moments that we don't want to relive from three years ago.”

Steph Curry was surprisingly open when asked for his thoughts and emotions from that Game 6 vs. the Raptors.

“It was mixed emotions all the way around,” Steph Curry explained. “KD's injury a couple days before, Klay going down, us just trying to find a way to stay alive. It was the end of an era at Oracle, as well. So there was a lot going on. It's hard to pick out exactly what you're feeling because it was all mixed together. We lost a game. Klay goes down; know he's probably going to be out for a while. You're getting ready for the summer, trying to regroup and figure out what's going to happen next year and all that.

“And to think it's three years ago and all that we've been through, all that Klay has been through personally since that time, and to be back here, it adds a sense of gratitude of being back on this stage. That chapter will always be part of our journey, for sure. That's something we'll probably talk about for a very long time.

“Hopefully we can get this job done and pay homage to that three-year journey actually leading to something truly special.”

As expected, Twitter reacted to questions Steve Kerr, Klay Thompson, Draymond Green, and Steph Curry were posed.

https://twitter.com/sftheletters/status/1536104025942175745

Warriors-Celtics Game 5 will mark the 31st time that the NBA Finals have been tied at 2-2. In the previous 30 instances, the team that wins Game 5 has gone on to win the series 73.3% of the time (22-8). Game 5 will tip off around 6:07PM PST.