LeBron James is the NBA’s new career scoring leader. With a step back jumper with 10.9 seconds left in the third quarter of the Los Angeles Lakers' game Tuesday night against Oklahoma City, James pushed his career total to 38,388 points and broke the record that Kareem Abdul-Jabbar held for nearly four decades. Abdul-Jabbar became the league’s all-time leading scorer on April 5, 1984 and wound up retiring in 1989 with 38,387 points. The game stopped for a ceremony after James broke the record and he had tears in his eyes as he thanked the crowd, Abdul-Jabbar, NBA Commissioner Adam Silver and others. James finished with 38 points in the Lakers' 133-130 loss and stands at 38,390.
LeBron James broke Kareem Abdul-Jabbar’s NBA career scoring record in an arena filled with stars and rocked by eager fans anticipating a crowning moment in his 20-year career. James chased the 36 points necessary to surpass Abdul-Jabbar with determination, scoring 20 in the first half. The fans roared with every point while he inched toward the mark held since April 1984 by Abdul-Jabbar, who watched the game from a baseline seat near the Lakers’ bench. James’ mother, wife and three children also watched from courtside amid the thousands who rose in waves of anticipation nearly every time James touched the ball.
Jalen Brunson scored 25 points and made the go-ahead basket with 1:13 left, Julius Randle had 22 points and 14 rebounds and the New York Knicks beat the Orlando Magic 102-98. Brunson’s running bank shot put the Knicks up for good at 94-93. He then fed Jericho Sims for a dunk and a three-point lead. The teams combined to shoot 10 free throw attempts in the final 7.7 seconds. The only miss was by Orlando’s Paolo Banchero, who intentionally tried to set up a tying basket with 2.3 seconds remaining. Markelle Fultz led the Magic with 21 points. Franz Wagner added 18 points and Banchero finished with 16 points after being held to four in the first half.
Deandre Ayton matched his career high with 35 points, Devin Booker scored 19 in his first game since Christmas and the Phoenix Suns held off Cam Thomas and the Brooklyn Nets 116-112. The 21-year-old Thomas led a late charge and finished with 43 points, becoming the youngest player in NBA history with three straight 40-point games. He had 44 and a career-high 47 points in his previous two games. Mikal Bridges had 17 of his 21 points in the second half and played a key role in the defensive effort that cooled off Thomas just long enough for the Suns to build a 12-point lead with 2:25 remaining.
Mat Ishbia says his first major project as owner of the Phoenix Suns will be to listen to employees and figure out what problems they’ve faced. After that, he’ll start fixing. The tenure of embattled Robert Sarver as owner of the NBA’s Suns and WNBA’s Phoenix Mercury officially ended Tuesday. That's when Ishbia — the chairman, president and chief executive of United Wholesale Mortgage, plus a member of Michigan State’s NCAA championship team in 2000 — took over. He will be governor, while brother Justin Ishbia will be alternate governor. Mat Ishbia told The Associated Press he plans to make adjustments in order to make the Suns “one of the best places to work.”
NHL
Bo Horvat scored in his home debut with New York Islanders, leading his new team to a 4-0 victory over the Seattle Kraken. Ilya Sorokin made 31 saves in his fifth shutout this season and No. 15 for his career. Samuel Bolduc, Simon Holmstrom and Zach Parise also scored in New York’s fourth straight win, and Jean-Gabriel Pageau added two assists. The Islanders acquired Horvat in a blockbuster trade with Vancouver on Jan. 30. The All-Star center then agreed to a $68 million, eight-year contract on Sunday. Martin Jones had 23 saves for the Pacific Division-leading Kraken.
Kris Letang scored 3:36 into overtime to cap a frantic rally as the Pittsburgh Penguins stunned the Colorado Avalanche 2-1. The Avalanche controlled long stretches of regulation before Pittsburgh's Bryan Rust tied it with 3:38 remaining in the third period forced overtime. Casey DeSmith made 41 saves for the Penguins, single-handedly keeping his team in it for the first two periods as Colorado dominated. Nathan MacKinnon scored his 14th goal of the season for the Avalanche. Pavel Francouz stopped 36 shots but couldn’t get a handle on a shot that became Letang’s fifth goal of the season.
U.S. Labor Secretary Marty Walsh is expected to leave the Biden administration to run the National Hockey League Players’ Association. That's according to two people familiar with his plans. The hockey players’ union has been searching for a new executive director to take over for Don Fehr. A serious fan of the Boston Bruins, Walsh showed an encyclopedic knowledge of the sport in videos posted online during his tenure from 2014 to 2021 as mayor of Boston. Walsh’s departure would make him the first of President Joe Biden’s Cabinet secretaries to leave.
NFL
Two people with knowledge of the situation say Las Vegas Raiders quarterback Derek Carr will visit the New Orleans Saints on Wednesday. They spoke condition of anonymity because they weren't authorized to comment publicly. One person termed the visit as “exploratory in nature.” Saints coach Dennis Allen was the Raiders’ coach when the club selected Carr in the second round of the 2014 draft out of Fresno State. Allen coached Carr for only four games before he was fired that year.
The New York Jets’ season began with aging Joe Flacco starting at quarterback. It ended the same way. And that was the problem. New York made five changes at quarterback with Flacco to Zach Wilson to Mike White, back to Wilson, back to White, back to Flacco. The Jets certainly weren’t alone with that sort of revolving door. NFL teams combined to start 68 quarterbacks which was the most in the Super Bowl era in a non-strike year.
The Chiefs and Eagles are bringing MVP finalists Patrick Mahomes and Jalen Hurts to the Super Bowl to cap a season in which the NFL had a glaring amount of instability at quarterback. A total of 68 QBs started at least one game, a record for a non-strike year. Nearly half of all changes during the regular season were because of injuries at the most important position, despite the league's efforts to try to keep QBs healthy. A record 13 teams used at least three starters, including the San Francisco 49ers, whose season ended in the NFC title game when they had no healthy quarterbacks available.
This year’s Super Bowl features a rare matchup of the NFL’s top two teams from the regular season. The Philadelphia Eagles and Kansas City Chiefs were the league’s only 14-game winners, marking just the sixth time since the 1970 merger that the squads with sole possession of the two best records in the regular season met for the championship. The last time it happened came after the 2013 season when Seattle beat Denver 43-8 in a matchup of 13-win teams.
TOP-25 MEN’S COLLEGE BASKETBALL
UConn beat Marquette 87-72.
Indiana defeated Rutgers 66-60.
