LeBron James has played a ton of games in the NBA Playoffs. In fact, he is the league’s all-time leader in games played in the postseason, thanks in large part to his incredible run of consecutive appearances in the Finals — and also his early start in the league.
With all those games under his belt, you would think that you’ve seen it all from LeBron James in the postseason. But here’s something new: for the first time ever in his career in the NBA, the Los Angeles Lakers superstar did not attempt a single shot from the field when he decided not to pull the trigger at all in the first quarter of Saturday night’s home game against Stephen Curry and the Golden State Warriors.
This LeBron James stat
This is the FIRST time in his playoff career he didn’t attempt a field goal in the first quarter pic.twitter.com/6D01ezmcmp
— ClutchPoints (@ClutchPointsApp) May 7, 2023
Instead, LeBron James let D’Angelo Russell and Anthony Davis carry most of the scoring duties in the opening period. Russell, in particular, came out of the gate like a house on fire, scoring all of the Lakers’ first 11 points of the contest (and 13 of their first 17).
LeBron gets his 1st field goal of the game with less than 6 mins left in the 2nd quarter
This is the second-latest time he had a late FGA. The last time was in 2003 vs. the Pistons.pic.twitter.com/uqIeYv3pSb
— ClutchPoints (@ClutchPointsApp) May 7, 2023
LeBron James, however, started to get going in the second quarter. He entered the halftime with 10 points on 2-for-5 shooting from the field and 5-for-6 from the free-throw line to go with si rebounds and seven assists in 21 minutes. Despite LeBron James shying away from taking a shot in the first quarter, the Lakers find themselves up big by the end of the second quarter, 59-48.
LeBron James entered Game 3 of the Warriors series leading the Lakers in the playoffs with 22.3 points per game.
The post LeBron James’ stunning start to LA-Warriors Game 3 has never been seen in his 274 playoff games appeared first on ClutchPoints.
