LeBron James brought the NBA to a standstill on Tuesday. Even the Los Angeles Lakers' game against the Oklahoma City Thunder was paused.
With 38 points at Crypto.com Arena, James moved to 38,390 in his regular season career, surpassing Kareem Abdul-Jabbar's long-standing record of 38,387.
The four-time champion has been the league's pre-eminent star across stints with the Cleveland Cavaliers, the Miami Heat and the Lakers.
Now, across basketball history, he stands alone.
It is a remarkable achievement and only becomes more impressive when delving into the numbers behind James' new record.
Beating the Thunder
The Thunder may have put a slight dampener on James' big night by winning Tuesday's game, but the 38-year-old actually has more career points than Oklahoma City's entire active roster combined (21,900).
Indeed, the Thunder are merely one of five rosters James can better, along with the Indiana Pacers (36,515), the Orlando Magic (33,164), the San Antonio Spurs (32,364) and the Houston Rockets (28,642).
Had James not got over the line on Tuesday, he would have done instead against the Milwaukee Bucks on Thursday – and that would have been fitting, too.
James has scored more points against the Bucks (1,751) than against any other team. In fact, the Thunder (994) are the team he has scored the third-fewest against – more only than against the Lakers (829) and the Cavaliers (580), two teams he represented.
The Lakers forward scored at least 1,000 points against each of the other 27 teams, while he has scored 1,000 in each of his 20 NBA seasons. That is another record he has taken from Abdul-Jabbar (19).
James would have no doubt enjoyed being able to achieve this legendary feat in front of a home crowd, but he has actually scored more points on the road (19,251 in 694 games) than at home (19,139 in 716).
Unsurprisingly, however, Cleveland's Rocket Mortgage FieldHouse is the arena to have seen the most James points (11,670). The Lakers' Crypto.com Arena (4,649) nudged ahead of the Heat's Miami-Dade Arena (4,613) into second place on Tuesday.
Wade's helping hand
In that home crowd in LA, sitting in front of Lakers owner Jeanie Buss, was Dwyane Wade, a two-time title-winning team-mate of James' on the Heat.
Wade also joined James on the Cavaliers for a season and, although now retired, has assisted more points for the new all-time scoring leader than any other player (776).
Eric Snow (630) is second on that list, with Mario Chalmers (591) third and Mo Williams (501) fourth, followed by Kevin Love (486) and Kyrie Irving (469).
Russell Westbrook has only been playing with James in LA since 2021, but he is ninth on 375. Anthony Davis (269) is 11th and Chris Bosh (267) 12th.
Ricky Davis assisted James' first NBA points and 42 altogether. Davis, who retired in 2010, was the first of 148 different players to assist James.
But the bulk of James' points have been unassisted, of course. His 26,855 unassisted points alone would rank him 13th in the all-time list, ahead of Kevin Durant (26,684), who is second to the Lakers man among active players.
James has scored 10,882 points from layups, 8,074 from two-point jump shots and 8,047 from free throws. Of the rest, 6,711 have come from three-pointers, 4,190 from dunks, 310 from hook shots and 176 from tip-ins.
Another Lakers record
The record was reached with a fadeaway jumper, and several members of Lakers royalty were in the house to see it – including Abdul-Jabbar.
James followed Abdul-Jabbar as the seventh different player to lead the NBA in all-time scoring since the end of the league's first season in 1946-47.
Four of those seven have now represented the Lakers, with James and Abdul-Jabbar joined by George Mikan (1952-53 to 1957-58) and Wilt Chamberlain (1965-66 to 1983-84). Chamberlain took ownership of the record while a Philadelphia 76er, before playing for the Lakers.
Chamberlain succeeded Bob Pettit, one of the remaining three who did not turn out for the Lakers. Joe Fulks, the leading scorer in the NBA's first season, and Dolph Schayes are the others.
Luka Doncic, just 23 and with 8,531 points through 311 career games, is perhaps the most credible challenger to James' crown. James had 8,319 points through 311 games, albeit he was only 22.
Matching James' longevity is a huge ask; either way, he will be number one for a long, long time.
Time spent at the top is a record Abdul-Jabbar can at least retain for now, having ranked first in scoring for a mammoth 14,187 days. The NBA was only 13,671 days old when he took the record, meaning he led the league for more than half of its existence.
Still more to achieve
That is not the only Abdul-Jabbar mark that remains, with the 75-year-old out in front on 57,446 minutes played. James (53,743) is third, while he is tied for ninth in games played (1,410) – a statistic led by Robert Parish (1,611).
Abdul-Jabbar is the man to beat for MVP awards, too, with six, and James' four appear unlikely to be added to now, given his age and the Lakers' woes.
James should pass Abdul-Jabbar for All-Star selections, though, as the pair are tied on 19, while the modern great already has a leading 13 All-NBA First Team selections.
In the playoffs, James already topped the charts for points (7,631) and games played (266), although the 'GOAT' debate will rage on as Michael Jordan has the edge in Finals MVPs (six to James' four).
Among players with 500 or more games, Jordan (30.1) is also the leading man for points per game in the regular season, even if James (27.2 in fifth) is averaging 30.2 this year, the third-highest mark of his career.
At that rate, even if James cannot reel in Jordan, he should be able to establish a considerable buffer to any and all pretenders to his new crown.
Jokic: Nuggets following 'phenomenal' Muray in NBA Finals
The Denver Nuggets are following the "phenomenal" Jamal Murray in the NBA Finals, says Nikola Jokic.
Jokic and Murray became the teammates in NBA Finals history to record triple-doubles as the Nuggets defeated the Miami Heat 109-94 on Wednesday to take a 2-1 lead in the series.
Two-time NBA MVP Jokic had 32 points, 21 rebounds and 10 assists for the first such game in Finals history, or at least the first since assists were tracked.
The triple-double was his 10th this postseason and 16th of his career, a number that trails only LeBron James (28).
Murray had 34 points and 10 assists and completed his first career playoff triple-double with a rebound with nine seconds remaining, and Jokic lauded his teammate for leading the Nuggets through the playoffs so far.
"He's playing phenomenally, I think, the whole playoffs," Jokic said of Murray.
"We're just following him and he's a really good leader. His energy is amazing, and we are just following.
"He's reading the game really well. He's getting guys involved, and I think he's mature, if that makes any sense, and he knows where to find the guys and how to control the game.
"It's not just us, it's the team, and like I said even before the series started, the Denver Nuggets need to beat Miami, not me and Jamal and whoever is on the other side. We as a group need to beat them."
Asked how proud he was of his record-achieving performance, Jokic replied: "To be honest, I just think it's a win because if you lose, nobody is going to even mention it. I don't care. It's just a stat."
The Nuggets' win came after they had lost Game 2 of the series at home.
Jokic added: "When you lose the game, of course it's a bad atmosphere, whatever, it's a bad momentum. But maybe it helped us to refocus and just be better in the details. But that doesn't mean that we can relax now or whatever. We need to have the same effort because they're going to be even better."
Nuggets coach Michael Malone eulogised over the performances of his star players.
"I think it's the first time in Finals history or maybe NBA history that two guys have 30, 10 triple-doubles, so that's incredible right there," Malone said.
"Regarding Nikola, nothing he does surprises me ever. This guy has shown time and time again that he's built for these moments. He thrives in these moments, the biggest stage. He did that once again tonight.
"I'm really proud of Jamal, and I could tell speaking to him yesterday, being around him the last 48 hours, that he was putting a lot of Game 2 on him, and it wasn't just him. It was me and every one of our players. It was collective.
"But that's what champions do. That's what warriors do. They battled back. I felt his presence all day long. Forget the stats for a second. I felt Jamal's presence, his energy, and he was here in the moment and for him and Nikola to do what they did tonight in a game that we needed to take, regain home-court advantage of the series was special to watch."
Reflecting on his performance in Game 2, Murray said: "I felt like I didn't bring the intensity that the moment called for. Even though I didn't play terrible, I felt like I could have done a lot more.
"Most people that have watched the Nuggets play, when I have a game like that, I'm most likely going to bounce back. Just one of those days. I think not just me but everybody bounced back. Everybody brought the energy.
"Everybody was just coming into the game and wanting to bring the intensity that we're used to playing with."
Denver stars rewrite the record books as Nuggets take series lead
Nikola Jokic and Jamal Murray created a piece of NBA Finals history as they inspired the Denver Nuggets to a 109-94 win over the Miami Heat and a 2-1 lead in the series.
The pair became the first teammates in finals history to chalk up triple-doubles – Murray finishing with 34 points, 10 rebounds and 10 assists while Jokic added 32 points, 21 rebounds and 10 assists in Miami.
“I’m just glad that we won the game,” Jokic said. “It was a big one for us because they won in our arena. We just didn’t want to go down 2-1. We were more locked in, more focused.”
Jimmy Butler scored 28 points for the Heat and Bam Adebayo finished with 22, but the hosts were unable to produce one of the comebacks which have been their trademark during the play-offs.
Seven times in the post-season they have rallied from at least 12 points, but down by 14 heading into the final quarter they were unable to produce another late rally.
The lead, which Denver had taken after sharing the first quarter and never surrendered in the second half, stretched out to 21 and even though Miami got it back to nine inside the final 90 seconds, they would get no closer.
Jokic finished with 12 for 21 from the floor as he extended the single-season record with his 10th triple-double of the play-offs and became only the seventh player to have more than one in the same finals series – only Magic Johnson and LeBron James have managed three.
Miami’s Udonis Haslem, who turns 43 on Friday, came off the bench in the final 30 seconds to become the oldest player in the NBA Finals, taking the record of Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.
Jokic, Murray have triple-doubles as Nuggets defeat Heat in Game 3 for 2-1 series lead
Nikola Jokic and Jamal Murray became the teammates in NBA Finals history to record triple-doubles and the Denver Nuggets defeated the Miami Heat 109-94 on Wednesday for a 2-1 lead.
Jokic had 32 points, 21 rebounds and 10 assists for the first such game in Finals history, or at least the first since assists were tracked. The triple-double was his 10th this postseason and 16th of his career, a number that trails only LeBron James (28).
Murray had 34 points and 10 assists and completed his first career playoff triple-double with a rebound with nine seconds remaining.
Christian Braun provided Denver with a lift off the bench, scoring 15 points on 7-of-8 shooting in 19 minutes. Aaron Gordon had 11 points, nine rebounds and five assists to help Denver win its fourth straight postseason road game.
The Nuggets took the lead for good late in the first half and outscored the Heat 29-20 in the third quarter for an 82-68 advantage heading into the final quarter. The lead ballooned to as big as 21 points before Miami whittled it down to 103-94 with just over a minute left.
Jimmy Butler scored 28 points, but Bam Adebayo was the only other Heat player with more than 10 points, adding 22 and 17 rebounds. Miami lost its third straight home playoff game after winning six in a row there.
Game 4 is Friday in Miami.
SportsMax is the Caribbean sports channel of choice, committed to providing sporting content of the highest quality to the Caribbean, delivered by a team of highly innovative, passionate and qualified professionals.
(876) 619-7629
digitalmedia@sportsmax.tv
