Washington (AFP)
Veteran star LeBron James celebrated his 38th birthday in the best way, when he scored his highest score this season in the NBA, achieving 47 points, 10 rebounds and 9 assists, to lead the Los Angeles Lakers to a 130-121 victory over the Atlanta Hawks.
This is the first time during the season that LeBron scored 40 points or more, the 70th in his rich two-decade career in the NBA.
He was the best player in the league four times and promised his colleagues before the match to score forty points in the Hawks basket: I asked for it, I told them before the match, I had to do it, after I scored a try out of five, I thought it was difficult to achieve.
Despite scoring an orphan basket from the first six attempts in reality, LeBron, who played his third match in four evenings, finished the match with 18 attempts out of 27.4 out of 6 three-pointers and 7 out of 9 on the free throw line.
The player nicknamed “The King” continued: I was not aware of the fact that if it was three matches in four evenings, I realized that I needed to be mentally and physically ready, making sure that my body was ready and the most important thing was my mind.
James became the fourth player in league history to score 45 points or more at the age of thirty-eight, joining Michael Jordan, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Jamal Crawford.
Led by Tray Young, the Hawks advanced by 15 points in the first half, before James Lakers carried him on his shoulders, scoring 16 points in the second and final quarters and 13 in the third.
And the Atlanta confrontation in 2009 was the only one in which LeBron scored more points on his birthday (48).
James is following in the footsteps of breaking the record for the best scorer in the history of the league held by Karim Abdul-Jabbar, and he may achieve this achievement next February.
And the Lakers, who ranked thirteenth in the Western Region (15-21), missed its other star, Anthony Davis, due to a foot injury.
His wife, his mother and a number of his relatives were present on the field, and he said: Their presence here and my support outside our stadium, on my birthday, is an important thing for me, because they are the rock in everything I do, my mother, my husband and my family.