Remember when Stephen Curry's perceived struggles were the talk of the postseason? When Kevin Durant was proving his case as the Golden State Warriors' clear-cut best player? When an especially knee-jerk set of NBA fans were wondering if Damian Lillard might actually be the league's best point guard?

Those narratives existed as recently as two weeks ago, when the Golden State Warriors were locked in a heated battle with the Houston Rockets in the second round of the playoffs. After Monday night, though, they seem much, much further off than that, to the point that it's almost impossible to believe they materialized in the first place.

The Warriors beat the Portland Trail Blazers 119-117 in Game 4, sweeping the Western Conference Finals and advancing to an unprecedented fifth consecutive NBA Finals. They did it without Durant, still nursing a calf injury, for the series' duration, and on Monday night won despite the absence of Andre Iguodala, who suffered a calf injury of his own in the latter stages of Game 3. Both players will now have ample time to recover and rest before playing for the chance to three-peat, a factor that shouldn't go overlooked in assessing the viability of the Warriors' title hopes.

But if Curry keeps playing like this, it might not matter whether or not Golden State is full-strength against the Milwaukee Bucks or Toronto Raptors. With a 37-point triple-double on Monday, he became just the fifth player ever to score at least 30 points in every game of a postseason sweep.

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Draymond Green on one side in a Golden State Warriors uniform with an arrow pointing to Draymond Green in a blank uniform, a bunch of question marks in the background

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Klay Thompson in a Warriors and Magic jersey

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Steph Curry to the Spurs rumors.

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For the series, Curry averaged a ridiculous 36.5 points, 8.3 rebounds, and 7.3 assists per game. He made over six threes per game on 42.5 percent shooting from beyond the arc, too, en route to a laughable true shooting percentage of 66.3.

Giannis Antetokoumpo or James Harden will win MVP, and Durant, Kawhi Leonard, and even LeBron James join them as players worthy of discussion as the best in the world. Curry, though, as has been obvious for years, clearly deserves to be mentioned in that debate, and after the Western Conference Finals, seems more deserving of the crown than at any point since 2015-16.