Stephen Curry (number 30) of Davidson College shoots over Maryland’s Will Bowers during a first round NCAA tournament game. His father, former NBA star Dell Curry, and his mother Sonya, an educator, insist that family and church values are more important than athletic stardom.

AP / David Duprey

Sonya Curry has shared her son, Stephen, with college basketball fans around the world. Now she’s eager for her turn to talk with the star of the NCAA tournament.

“I haven’t had the opportunity to sit down and talk with Stephen about how he has done with all the media attention,” Curry says. “It was new for us watching, but I want to hear about the experience from his perspective.”

Don’t worry about his feelings, Stephen’s dad, former NBA star Dell Curry, advises his wife. He’s all right.

“My husband says, ‘Sonya, You look at it in a whole different way. He’s going to be fine.’ And I wonder, ‘Is that true?’ Sometimes Stephen has been nervous. Sometimes Mommy’s right.”

Hours after Stephen Curry and his Wildcat teammates returned to the Davidson College campus north of Charlotte, N.C., after a history-making string of victories and a stunning loss to Kansas, the students switched back into book mode. Exams loomed.

“After exams, at the end of the school year, we like to go somewhere as a family for at least four days — just us,” Curry says. “We are all going in so many different directions. It’s important to get reacquainted as a family.”

Stephen’s coach, Bob McKillop, is among those who have called the Currys a model family. Here are several reasons why:

•Whether in the gym with his dad or at school where his mom is principal, Stephen grew up spending a lot of time with his parents.

•Mom and Dad are both competitive but balance each other out. At games, as her son pops jump shots, Sonya is the cheerleader bouncing up and down, waving, praying, weeping. Her more laid-back husband usually stays seated, studying the game.

•At home, the parents try not to “over-coach” their three children or point out what’s wrong. “When our kids are home, they’re home,” she says.

•Mom and Dad have instilled values and priorities in their children: First God, then family and everything else comes after that. At Davidson, Stephen’s coaches are among role models who have continued to instill the same values.

Stephen decided on his own, during a recruiting visit in the family’s South Charlotte home, that he wanted to go to Davidson.

Curry says she told the coach: “I know he needs to be bigger. We will fatten him up over the summer.” But McKillop said, “I’ll take him just the way he is.” The mother recalls she was teary but at ease, “knowing that this man understands my child is developing into a man.”

Dad’s success as an NBA player has drawn lots of attention, but Mom is plenty competitive. She has had her own successes as a volleyball player for Virginia Tech and as the owner of a Christian Montessori School a few miles from the elite Davidson College.

“I tell the kids that I know what I’m talking about, that I have a sense of the game,” she says. “Dell has far exceeded more than I have. But sometimes when he tries to give advice, the kids say, ‘OK, whatever Dad.’

Just like in most families, no matter how much expertise Mom and Dad have, their teenagers look at them “like we’re crazy.” .

On Mother’s Day today, the Curry family will follow their tradition, attending church and enjoying a meal together. Then Curry is counting on her favorite present: time alone. She says she likes to have time by herself each Mother’s Day to go a special botanical garden and to reflect on being a mom, and pray for strength for the coming year as a parent.

“It’s tough being Mommy,” she says. “All I want is the gift of time.”Can you help?

Q. “My 4-year-old daughter is not aggressive at school, but at home she has started hitting, scratching and kicking her older brother and sister if she doesn’t like what they are doing. How should I deal with this?”

— A mother in Concord, N.C.

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