LOS ANGELES — In Tuesday’s contest against the LA Clippers, LeBron James scored 46 points with a career-high nine made 3-pointers.
After this workmanlike effort, LeBron has now scored a 40-point game against all 30 teams in the NBA.
However, even this massive production was not enough to defeat the Clippers as they won comfortably, 133-115, in a bitter battle between crosstown rivals at the Crypto.com arena in downtown Los Angeles.
“I was able to make a few shots tonight and try to help us stay in the game,” James later remarked. “But the Clippers, they are really good. Exceptionally good when they’re shooting the 3-ball, and tonight they did that.”
Indeed, the Clippers shot 15 for 22 (68.2%) from deep in the first half, allowing them a 77-54 lead to start the third quarter and the Lakers could never recover. The Clippers went 19-38 from 3-point distance to finish the game.
LeBron’s ninth 3-pointer closed the gap to 113-103 with just under seven minutes to play in the fourth quarter but the Clippers took over and cruised for the rest of the game.
“(James) had a great shooting game, but we weathered the storm,” Clippers coach Tyronn Lue later said. “When they cut (the lead) to 10 and LeBron is on fire like that … we just tried to take everyone else out and make him go one-on-one.”
Paul George had 27 points, Kawhi Leonard notched 25 points, and Norman Powell added 22 points to the Clippers’ victory.
Conversely, after LeBron’s 46 points, the next Lakers leading scorer was Russell Westbrook with 17 points.
