The Los Angeles Lakers are set to welcome the Washington Wizards tonight for a chance to move to 17-2 on the young season. The Lakers are favored by double-digits in the contest and expected to make short work of the 6-10 Wizards who continue to play without their injured All-Star point guard, John Wall. But while this year’s version of LeBron James will enter the game leading the league in assists, it was only two years ago this month that James exploded for one of the most prolific scoring nights of his NBA career.
On November 3, 2017, LeBron scored the second-most points he ever has in a game when he hung 57 on the Wizards during a 130-122 Cleveland Cavaliers victory. James shot 23-of-34 from the field, connected on all nine free throws, and made 2-of-4 triples to finish with a game-high scoring effort only bested by the 61 points he totaled in 2014 against the Charlotte Hornets. LeBron would also collect 11 rebounds, dish out seven assists and snag three steals during the historic effort.
LeBron scored in a variety of ways that night against the Wizards. He backed down Bradley Beal for a bully-ball bankshot off the left block. He caught backdoor passes for reverse layups at the rim from teammates like Jeff Green. He stripped Kelly Oubre Jr. on the defensive end to create transition buckets and knocked down triples when big men like Martin Gortat switched out onto him behind the arc. King James was simply a movie that night, providing one of the most remarkable scoring efforts he’s ever offered the NBA community.
“Every shot that I took, I felt like it was going in,” LeBron told The Associated Press after the game.
That night against Washington–after scoring a career high 61 in 2014–James scored one more point than he did against the Toronto Raptors in 2005 (56 points) and two more points than he scored against the Milwaukee Bucks in 2009 (55 points). LeBron’s 52-point effort in 2005 against the Bucks currently rounds out the five highest-scoring games of his 17-year career.
