Mavs’ Doncic scores 73, Suns’ Booker goes for 62
Luka Doncic and Devin Booker went on another NBA scoring spree on Friday night, making this a week like none other in league history.
Doncic broke his own Dallas franchise record by scoring 73 points — tying the fourth-most in NBA history — and Booker scored 62 for the Phoenix Suns in the second highest-scoring game of his career to add to a week of offensive explosions the likes of which the league has never seen.
Friday marked only the fifth time in NBA history — and amazingly, the second time this week — where two players scored at least 60 points, after Joel Embiid scored 70 for Philadelphia and Karl-Anthony Towns had 62 for Minnesota on Monday.
Before that, the most recent such occurrence of two 60-point games on the same day was on April 9, 1978, when David Thompson scored 73 and George Gervin scored 63. Doncic had a game topped by only Chamberlain and Kobe Bryant — Friday was the fourth anniversary of the Lakers great’s death — on the NBA’s all-time scoring list. Chamberlain scored 100 on March 2, 1962; Bryant scored 81 on Jan. 18, 2006; Chamberlain had 78 on Dec. 8, 1961.
And now, Doncic has joined their echelon, his 73 tying Thompson and Chamberlain (who did it twice) for fourth-most ever in an NBA game. Doncic’s previous career best was 60 points. He made 25 of 33 shots in Dallas’ 148-143 win over Atlanta, plus went 15 of 16 from the foul line and 8 of 13 from 3-point range.As if all that wasn’t enough, Doncic had 10 rebounds and seven assists. Booker, whose career high is 70, made 22 of his 37 shots from the field, 12 of 13 from the line and 6 of 12 from 3-point range in the Suns’ 133-131 loss at Indiana. He missed a 3-pointer at the buzzer.
He has scored at least 59 points three times in his career and somehow, the Suns are 0-3 in those games.