“A bet is not official until you look a man in the eye, so I had to look him in the eye and I was able to win this one.”
To the delight of his teammates and with James still not facing the basket, the kick went in, causing the Lakers’ bench to explode in celebration.
Although his repertoire of extraordinary skills is broad and varied, three points have not been a regularity for James.
Then, after impressing his teammates with his feat on Tuesday, James paid tribute to Steph Curry, one of the NBA’s greatest pitchers of all time and someone who made shooting without looking more common.
“Because 10 times out of nine, it’s going to Steph.”
The ridiculous, without looking at three points, was the culmination of the Lakers’ dominant 117-100 victory over the Rockets.
Behind James ’26 points and Antony Davis’ 19 points, the current NBA champions improved their record to 9-3 in the league and are now unbeaten away from home.
‘This situation is crazy’
For the Rockets, it was a turbulent start for the 2020-21 season.
After the defeat on Tuesday – in which the Rockets overtook the Lakers by up to 30 points in some stages – Harden called the team’s situation “crazy”.
Despite the addition of veterans like John Wall and DeMarcus Cousins, the Rockets’ normally fluid offensive looks confused this year.
And this is synthesized by Harden’s own struggles. The 31-year-old has won the NBA champion title in the past three seasons, but has failed to score more than 20 points in four consecutive games, the longest since 2012.
“We are not even close, honestly, to this team – obviously the defending champion – and to all the other elite teams out there,” said Harden. “You can tell the difference in these last two games.
“Obviously, chemistry, knowledge of talent, everything, and it was clear as I said in the last games. From the beginning of the game, they were just aggressive, a veteran team, obviously a champion team and one of the best teams we have in this league . “
Missing one star, leaning on another
With Kyrie Irving absent in his fourth consecutive game due to personal reasons, the Brooklyn Nets had to rely on another superstar to help them out of a hole on Tuesday night.
The Nets, led by Kevin Durant’s 34 points, 13 assists and 9 rebounds, recovered from an 18-point handicap in the second half to beat the Denver Nuggets 122-116 on Tuesday night.
During the game, Durant overtook Elgin Baylor, Dwyane Wade and Adrian Dantley on the all-time scoring list and moved up to 28th.
Regarding Irving’s absence, Nets general manager Sean Marks said the organization was “aware of a social media video featuring Kyrie Irving at a family reunion”.
“We are reviewing circumstances with Kyrie and the NBA to determine compliance with health and safety protocols,” said Marks. “Kyrie remains away from the team for personal reasons.
“The date of his return has not yet been set. In the meantime, we will continue to focus on our organizational goals. Kyrie will have an opportunity to deal with his absence when he is ready to do so.”
Irving has not yet commented publicly.
More games postponed
Meanwhile, six NBA games have been postponed this season due to the league’s health and safety protocols.
For the third time in less than a week, the Boston Celtics had a game postponed due to problems with the Covid-19.
The home game scheduled for Wednesday at the TD Garden against the Orlando Magic was canceled after the league said in a statement that testing and contact tracking within the Celtics organization left the team short of the eight available players required by the NBA for the Celtics to take the court.
In addition, it was also announced that Wednesday’s game, Utah Jazz vs. Washington Wizards, was postponed because the Wizards would not have the required eight players in the league. This means that five games have been canceled since Sunday.