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There are no words, as clichè as it sounds. I will attempt to clumsily word what I witnessed on Friday night.
Diamond Leong of Bay Area News Group had an excellent oral history of what went down.
Tim Kawakami of San Jose Mercury News wrote up a breakdown of every single shot.
And the always superb Ethan Sherwood Strauss of ESPN capsulating what Klay Thompson has become.
And then the best of them all, Draymond Green:
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There are certain points during an event when in that exact moment, something tangibly out of reach rises up and slaps you in the face with a force of a million improbabilities, goosebumps start to form. On Friday night at Oracle Arena, in the midst of an innocuous game against the Sacramento Kings, Klay Thompson set the entire Milky Way ablaze. There's no concrete verbiage to describe the way he went about this historic outburst besides simply mentioning the "37 points in a single quarter, an NBA-record that eclipsed Wilt Chamberlain's 100-pointt night and something MIchael Jordan has never done". You even utter something insinuating this game and you will always remember the exact flavor of jelly bean you had that afternoon. Vanilla.
Klay Thompson was just a guy from Washington State too slow and unathletic to defend and create his own shot. Klay Thompson was known more as the second fiddle to Stephen Curry than an actual Splash Brother of the same ilk. Klay Thompson was a good two-way player but those were backhanded compliments meant to assuage fears over his mediocre offense. Klay Thompson should be flipped for Kevin Love. Klay Thompson is a freaking superstar.
Tonight didn't change what was gradually certain this entire season. Klay Thompson had become his own player, slowly disengaging from Curry's hip and flinging threes and hammer dunks down his own way. Friday night didn't need to combust itself into Thompson's breakout party but it was a damn nice way to do it. It started with oohs and ahhs that emanated from the crowd the instant Curry and Klay broke past the half-court line before the alley-oop. Consider that, a quarter that featured nine threes and viciously opened with a one-handed slam. This is the Klay Thompson of 2015.
On any other game, I'd talk about the Pinnacle Moment of this basketball team. Of just how great and aesthetically awesome all of this is and has been. But right now, Klay Thompson owns the Bay Area in a way that Buster Posey and Stephen Curry could. That's something. Midway through the explosion, the apoplectic throbbing mass chanted "Klay Thomp-son" over and over again. They hollered it the way they charmed Stephen Curry with "M-V-P!" chants. Minutes later, after several more roof-shattering treys, the still-drunk crowd shook their collective heads in disbelief before hyperactively stammering "Klay! Klay! Klay!"
Two different kinds of names for Thompson, a player they've loved but never intimately rooted for in this setting or admiration. An incredible night that shook the fanbase to its core, affirming Thompson as a superstar, and someone that is on his way to the stratosphere only the greats drew breath from. There are things that Klay Thompson are not and may never become. But on Friday night, and this entire season, Klay Thompson was everything.
So just sit on back, reminisce on whatever exact thing you were doing that night, and let those chills wash over you.