Trail Blazers' Curry calls Barton, Nuggets 'sassy' after Game 6 dustup

Seth Curry isn't a fan of the Denver Nuggets' behavior in Game 6.

The Portland Trail Blazers guard was front and center in a fourth-quarter mix-up between the two teams on Thursday after attending to teammate Zach Collins, who had fallen while drawing an offensive foul from Nikola Jokic. Curry pushed back Will Barton as he helped Collins up, and the Nuggets guard quickly reciprocated.

The two needed to be separated, and Curry says Barton discreetly poked him in the eye during the scuffle to ignite the escalation.

"He waited for a few people to get in between us, and when a few people were in between us, he put his finger in my eye," Curry said postgame, according to ESPN's Ohm Youngmisuk. "You know what I'm saying. I can't allow people to put their fingers in my eye.

"That's real sassy. They got a few sassy dudes over there. Front-runners. And we can't allow that."

Barton, however, downplayed the incident while denying he purposely poked Curry in the eye.

"It ain't no beef," Barton said. "I wasn't even looking for that. I was just trying to protect myself. I guess he thought I was trying to stand on top of him and be tough. I was just trying to get out of the way before I got injured. He pushed me. I'm not going to let nobody push me. But that's nothing."

Hostilities aside, Curry finished the game with only three points, but he was a plus-19 in 21 minutes as Portland won 119-108 to force Game 7. Barton led Denver's reserve unit with seven points, though he recorded a minus-25 in 26 minutes - the lowest mark among all players in the contest.

Both parties will get the chance to settle the score in Sunday's winner-take-all in Denver.