NBA: All the ways Westbrook’s triple-double season is a singular feat
Russell Westbrook tallied his 42nd triple-double Sunday night, breaking the season record set by Oscar Robertson in 1961-62 with the Cincinnati Royals. Westbrook’s 50-point, 16rebound, 10-assist performance in the Oklahoma City Thunder’s comeback win over the Denver Nuggets included a 3-pointer at the buzzer. And it capped a feat that is amazing in many ways — some obvious, some not as much:
1. Westbrook is averaging 31.9 points, 10.7 rebounds and 10.4 assists per game. He will be the second player in history to average a triple- double in a season, after Robertson.
2. Westbrook has more than twice as many triple-doubles this season as any other NBA player. Going into Sunday, James Harden was next with 20, followed by LeBron James with 12. (James recorded his 13th Sunday in an overtime loss.) The rest of the league combined had 38.
3. No other Thunder player has a triple-double this season. The last Thunder player other than Westbrook and Kevin Durant (who’s now with the Golden State Warriors) to record a triple-double was Serge Ibaka in 2012. The last player for the franchise with more than one tripledouble in a season was Gary Payton in 2002, when the team was the Seattle SuperSonics.
4. Westbrook has 79 career tripledoubles, fourth all-time behind Robertson, Magic Johnson and Jason Kidd. His 42 this season would be good enough for eighth all time.
5. Westbrook’s triple-double total by season since he joined the league in 2008-09: 1,1, 3, 0, 1, 2, 11, 18, 42.
6. Thirteen of Westbrook’s tripledoubles this season have come in three quarters or less.
7. Westbrook scored 57 points against the Orlando Magic on March 29, surpassing the record for points scored while collecting a triple-double. Scoring 50 points in a tripledouble has been done five times this season: three times by Westbrook and twice by Harden. From 1976 to 2015, it was never done.
8. Westbrook has scored a tripledouble this season against 27 of 29 opponents, failing only against the Chicago Bulls and the Portland Trail Blazers. (And he fell just one rebound short against Chicago.)
9. When Robertson set his mark, it was not especially heralded: The term triple-double was not regularly used at the time. Though other publications started a little earlier, The New York Times first gingerly tried it in 1984, though it used a clunky variant, saying that Jeff Ruland “responded with a triple double-digit effort.”
10. Robertson’s 1961-62 season was good for only third in the MVP voting, behind legendary centres Bill Russell and Wilt Chamberlain. Westbrook will probably better that, too.