LeBron James made history on Tuesday by becoming the first player in NBA history to score 50,000 career points, further cementing his status as the league’s all-time leading scorer.
The Los Angeles Lakers star entered the game against the New Orleans Pelicans with 49,999 career points, combining regular season and postseason totals, following a 17-point performance in Sunday’s victory over the Los Angeles Clippers.
It only took a brief moment for the 40-year-old NBA legend to secure the one point needed to surpass the 50,000-point milestone.
James, who is in dazzling form in the 22nd season of a glittering career, gathered a pass from Luka Doncic and unfurled a sublime 25-foot three-pointer to move to 50,002 points with the Crypto.com Arena crowd roaring their acclaim.
James finished with 34 points, eight rebounds and six assists while Doncic delivered another impressive display with 30 points and 15 assists as the Lakers went on to win 136-115 – their seventh straight victory.
“I’m not going to sugar-coat it – it’s a hell of a lot of points,” James said afterwards when asked about his 50,000-point scoring milestone.
“I’m super blessed to be able to put up that many points in my career in the best league in the world and against the best players in the world – it’s pretty special.”
James had passed Kareem Abdul-Jabbar’s previous all-time regular-season scoring record of 38,387 points in 2023 – itself a record that had stood for 39 years.
James is now nearly 6,000 points clear of Abdul-Jabbar’s total career points tally of 44,149, with Karl Malone third (41,689 points) and the late Kobe Bryant fourth with 39,283 points.
Michael Jordan is fifth on the all-time scoring list with 38,279.
Among active NBA players, only Kevin Durant with just over 35,000 points – roughly 15,000 points behind James – makes the top 10.
Lakers legend Earvin Magic Johnson led the tributes to James’ achievement.
“Congratulations to the King LeBron James for becoming the only player in NBA history to score 50,000 regular season and playoff points!” Johnson wrote on X.
James’ scoring achievement on Tuesday came just hours after he set another NBA record by being named Western Conference Player of the Month for February.
This made him the oldest player ever to win a Player of the Month award. James played a key role in guiding the Lakers to a 10-2 record in February, averaging 29.3 points, 10.5 rebounds, and 6.9 assists.
