TORONTO — In the final moments of a frantic fourth quarter, he flicked his wrist and the ball left his hands. For a moment, everyone in the ring held their breath. The camera traces a silent arc through the humid air of Scotiabank Arena, a perfect parabola of faith and physics. Then, net. There is nothing but the Internet.
Silence, then confusion.
advertise
Hachimura, alone in the left corner, raised three fingers to the sky. LeBron James, forever trapped in eight points, opened his arms and cheered without any burden. The winning streak is dead. The Lakers survived.
123-120.
A streak of 1,297 consecutive regular-season games in which he scored in double figures — a record dating back to Jan. 6, 2007 that spanned adolescence, primes and hard years — ended not with a whimper but with a final bang. Finally passed.
“Just playing the right way,” James said. “You always make the right play. That’s my MO, that’s how I was taught to play. I’ve done that my whole career.”
advertise
The night requires sacrifice. It needs other heroes. With Luka Doncic out, the offense is run by Austin Reeves, a kid from a town of 200 who once came to Vegas as a ball boy. He scored 22 and 44 points in a symphony of offense and shooting in the third quarter. He made 13 of 21 shots, performed well at the free throw line, and dished out 11 assists. Overnight, he was the sun the Lakers revolved around.
“He told me before the game that he was a little tired,” Hachimura said. “I guess he’s not.”
But Toronto, annoying and stubborn, fought back. Scotty Barnes scored 23 points on offense. Brandon Ingram scored 20 points and was probed. The lead evaporates. Tensions mount. With 23 seconds left, Ingram hit a layup. Reeves put away his body and pushed, feeling that the trap was coming.
“I heard their coach telling Scotty to fire,” Reeves recalled.
advertise
He knows what to do. He took two dribbles, drew two defenders, and then passed the ball over the top. To LeBron.
James made 4 of 17 shots that night and only scored 8 points. The math is simple, but the choices are significant. He caught it, he turned around, and he saw Hachimura. He didn’t see the stripe. He saw the man who was open.
“I wanted to get Rui on the same side so I could get something back,” James said. “My payback point.”
The pass is like a bullet, on time, hitting the target. “Right in Rui’s shooting pocket,” James said.
“I knew it was coming for me,” Hachimura said. “I am ready.”
First-year Lakers coach J.J. Redick watched from the sidelines. He saw calculus, history, and disinterested geometry.
advertise
“LeBron is acutely aware of how many points he has at that moment,” Redick said. “Like he’s done so many times in his career … he made the right plays. The basketball gods, if you do things the right way, they tend to reward you.”
In the locker room afterwards, the atmosphere was not to mourn the end of the record, but to celebrate the birth of victory. The trace is a monument, but it is stone. This victory was made in flesh and blood.
“No,” James said when asked how he felt about ending his winning streak. “We won.”
Reeves, the locomotive that night, saw a deeper lesson.
“When you have the greatest basketball player of all time and you’re willing to make sacrifices … everybody has to fall in line,” Reeves said. “You don’t line up, you look crazy.”
advertise
In 1,297 games, LeBron James defined consistency, an uninterrupted river of scoring. In Game 1,298, he redefined legacy. Not a shot, but a pass. Not the statistics, but the wins. The numbers stopped. The winner did not.
The final whistle sounded. Eight villages were besieged. James smiled, a smile that was bright and weightless. Years of streaks were gone, lost in the Toronto night. On hard courts, it’s the better stuff that stays in its place. Something lasting.
A victory. A team. Correct play.
