OAKLAND, Calif. -- On April 11, onlookers bore witness to the most interesting Golden State Warriors sight in a month. Stephen Curry and Kevin Durant hoisted one shot after another. “Boom.” “Boom.” The shots rained in quickly, in succession, impervious to some energetic defense.

It was the vision many had for the team this season: Durant and Curry on the bright gold court, scoring with unbelievable ease. It was the apotheosis of what this whole project was supposed to be, two unstoppable forces working in concert.

And then practice ended.

Tuesday saw the rare instance of Curry and Durant shooting on the same court, an idea ginned up by Golden State assistant coach Bruce Fraser. First, Fraser ran the two superstars against each other. (“Steph won the first shooting game, Kevin won the second.”) Then, against “The Ogre,” a mythical beast that wins when you miss a certain number of shots (the point system is usually a miss equals four points for The Ogre, a made shot is one point, play to 21). Steph and KD combined to defeat the beast.

Their dynamic hasn’t been completely fluid, but the Warriors have achieved massive success despite that. It helps that both remain tremendous individual talents, flanked by two other All-Stars. The main reason the Steph/KD duo hasn’t wowed quite the way many had expected is probably that both prefer to be the ball handler in pick-and-rolls. That has been an issue in crunch time, but given this team's overwhelming quality, there hasn’t been much crunch time to endure this season.

Kevin Durant went for 29 points and Steph Curry added 20 in the Warriors' win in their regular-season finale. EPA/John G. Mabanglo

The postseason will assuredly bring on crunch time. Margins tend to narrow as teams grab and hold the Warriors’ off-ball attack in a playoff crucible that allows more contact. Golden State just might need the Curry/Durant dynamic to be a bit more, well, dynamic.

Fortunately for the Warriors, the best might be yet to come. Playoff games still have the potential, at times, to resemble that Tuesday practice. If the Warriors are truly lucky, playoff games will have the musk of Golden State’s 109-94 stomping of the Los Angeles Lakers on Wednesday, in which Durant unlocked a 3-point shot that hadn’t quite been there over his past 20 games.

The playoffs are pressing, but the Warriors are probably in a better position to chase their title dream this time around. Golden State locked up the No. 1 seed in all but technicality back on March 29, with their massive comeback win in San Antonio. Little drama has followed, as the good ship Warriors cruised into its loading dock. As the playoffs approach, the Warriors are, as Steve Kerr put it Wednesday, “just kind of easing into it.“

“It’s more subdued this year, more business-like,” Kerr said, comparing last season with this one. “It’s similar to two years ago in terms of the way the season ended. We had the 1-seed locked up for the last week or two, two seasons ago, and we were kind of able to decide how we wanted to go into the postseason.

“The difference is, now we’ve been doing this for a few years, and that year it was brand new. There was a freshness about it. This year it’s more business-like. It’s, 'All right, we’ve been through this. We know where we are. Let’s make sure we’re prepared.'"

"All right, we’ve been through this" felt like this team’s slogan at times, for all the novelty of so many stars under one roof. There seems to be a world-weariness to this unit -- fewer laughs, more of a veteran presence. Call it the David Westification of the Warriors. Music often blared during the first title run. Nowadays, the constant patter and blast of Draymond Green’s voice is the main locker-room soundtrack. He and West represent different aspects of this team’s spirit, the voluble and the stoic. Right now, whatever’s informing this recent run of play seems to be working.

This mix of veterans makes up the league’s best defense, regardless of the team's final defensive rating (a shade behind the Spurs, who play in fewer blowouts). Green has been essential to that effort, as has Andre Iguodala, who has been brilliant since the All-Star break. When Durant went down with the Feb. 27 MCL injury, it would have been reasonable to expect this defense to buckle. Durant was the best shot-blocker on a roster that had lost its rim protectors over the offseason.

Instead, Green, Iguodala, Klay Thompson and others went on a telepathic tear against opposing offenses. On their spring road swing, Green and Co. did the following to this season’s MVP candidates: Russell Westbrook was held to 4-of-16 and 15 points, James Harden to 5-of-20 and 24 points and Kawhi Leonard to 7-of-20 and 19 points.

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The end of the season was a collective triumph, but there wasn’t much individual glory to be mined. Green might well get DPOY, but the Warriors are probably too stacked for their own MVP. Should they lose, excuses made for them will be few, sympathy extended meager. They’re too good. That’s too bad.

Perhaps that’s why these Warriors are happy to be free of hoopla this time around. A considerable portion of last year revolved around 73 wins and the expectations that came with them. This time, there’s only one goal, though the expectations remain immense. As the Warriors gear up to play the Portland Trail Blazers, they seek a path to history. They seek it on the practice floor at 1011 Broadway in Oakland, with Durant and Curry firing freely, together. Now it’s time to take the show to the biggest of stages and, the Warriors hope, the biggest of prizes.