Downtown development
NBA’s 3-point totals keep on building up
MIAMI — Another year. Another record. The NBA’s 3-point craze is not slowing down.
For the sixth consecutive season, NBA teams combined to set a league-wide record for 3-pointers made. Last season’s number was 23,748, and No. 23,749 of this season went in Friday night. The league is more than 8 percent ahead of last year’s pace, and 25,000 is very possible.
So clearly, the reliance on the 3-pointer is not going to decrease anytime soon.
“I think it’s a trend for a while — but at some point it has to peak,” said Cleveland forward Kevin Love, one of the many NBA big men who has no trouble making 3s, which is a major reason why the totals are soaring
“Every position, one through five, is now shooting 3s. You see that as such a weapon. It makes the game fun, makes it interesting. There’s definitely a lot of spacing out there, and it’s wild to see.”
That “peak” Love spoke of isn’t on the horizon, though. Of the league’s 30 teams, 19 are either on pace to set — or have already set — franchise records for made 3s this season, and a couple of others are within reasonable striking distance.
There are shooters now all over the league. Only four seasons ago, the total of NBA players who made at least 100 3s was 57. This year, that total is going to be close to doubled. Across the NBA this season, 91 percent of players have attempted at least one 3-pointer and 81 percent of players have made at least one.
Rookies are making them. Utah’s Donovan Mitchell has 174 and is closing in on the record for a first-year player (185 by Portland’s Damian Lillard in 2012-13) with six games left on the Jazz’s schedule. Also making them are 7-footers. Eight player listed at that height or taller will likely get to the 100 mark by the end of the season.
And the league as a whole is actually getting better at them. Accuracy from 3-point range has gone up about 1.5 percent over the past three seasons, definitely one of the reasons why scoring per game is higher than it has been at any point in nearly 30 years.
“We all like to get out there, shoot a lot of 3s, spread the floor and try to move the ball as much as you can,” Houston coach Mike D’Antoni said. “Everybody is more or less the same … with the same outline — just get it done in different ways.”
The first season in which the NBA combined to make 15,000 3-pointers was 2009-10, and that seems like ages ago. The 20,000 plateau was broken just two seasons ago, and barring something very unusual, this season’s total will top 25,000.
“Wow. Wow. Wow,” Love said, upon hearing the numbers.
He knew the 3-point pace was higher than ever. But he didn’t think the record would be set this early, and that the previous mark would be obliterated.
“I’m sure there’s a ceiling,” Orlando Magic coach Frank Vogel said. “I just don’t know what it is.”
Neither does anyone else.