James passes Kareem for scoring mark
Behind a mask, the creases by Steve Kerr's eyes crinkled, betraying a pained grin as he prepared to tip off against the Lakers.
He had been asked by a reporter about his assessment of an looming LeBron James milestone. The 37-year-old was poised to become the all-time leading scorer in NBA history by an unconventional measurement, with both regular season and playoff points combined. And it made a cosmic kind of sense that James was about to make history at Golden State's expense.
“I feel like I witnessed a lot of those postseason points,” Kerr said. “That's a spectacular statistic, maybe not one that is going to be celebrated as if it were the regular season record, but that's incredible when you think about all the players who have played in this league.”
In the third quarter, James did it, sinking a 3-pointer off an assist by Anthony Davis to give him 21 points on the night and pass Lakers great Kareem Abdul-Jabbar's mark of 44,149 points in all of his NBA games.
James has enjoyed one of his best scoring seasons this year, averaging 29.1 points per game entering Saturday night's game. Scoring 26 points total, James extended his streak of scoring 25 points or more to 22 games, which is the longest such streak of his career. He surpassed his previous best of 21 games, which was set back in 2008 when James was 23 years old.
“That's pretty cool. It's incredible,” coach Frank Vogel said. “Everything the guy has done throughout his career is just remarkable. It's why I believe he's the greatest ever to play.”
James took a shorter route to the record. His appearance against Golden State was his 1,350th career regular-season game, combined with 266 postseason games, giving him 1,616 games overall. Abdul-Jabbar played through his 42nd birthday, winding up with 1,797.
Abdul-Jabbar holds one of the NBA's most hallowed records, scoring 38,387 points. If James keeps to his career scoring average (27.1 ppg), he could overtake the Captain in 69 games, passing him sometime next season. James' surge in scoring this season helps build optimism that he might be able to keep up (or even speed up) the pace.
One of the skills Kerr appreciates most is James' capacity for reinvention. When Kerr was an NBA analyst, he noticed how James forced the Spurs to change how they guarded him on screens because of his improved 3-point shooting. By the time Kerr became Golden State's coach and had to face James in four straight Finals, he was a more complete scorer aside from his natural talent for barreling to the basket.
“You had to worry about his getting downhill,” he said. “The strength of his game is his passing, and yet, he's this freight train coming downhill at you. And then, oh by the way, he's shooting 38% from three or whatever it was. Everything changed after that, as far as what you had to deal with. That's pretty remarkable.”