Kevin Durant stands alone in U.S. Olympic basketball scoring historical past.
Durant is now the profession chief in factors for the U.S. in Olympic competitors, passing Lisa Leslie for the mark in the course of the People’ quarterfinal recreation towards Brazil on Tuesday.
Durant’s basket with 3:06 left within the third quarter gave him six factors within the recreation and 489 in his 4 Olympic appearances. Leslie completed her 4 Olympic appearances with 488 factors and 4 gold medals.
He completed with 11 factors, so the brand new report is 494 — and counting.
“Data are supposed to be damaged,” Durant stated. “Someone will come alongside to do the identical. I’m centered on making an attempt to win this gold.”
Durant is bidding to turn into the primary males’s participant in Olympic historical past with 4 golds after being a part of the U.S. groups that gained titles at London 2012, Rio de Janeiro 2016 and the Tokyo Video games that had been held three years in the past.
“Coaching staffs, the work that we put in, simply maintaining my physique prepared and simply staying within the fitness center, to be trustworthy,” Durant stated when requested final week what he attributes to his longevity.
Durant is the No. 8 scorer in NBA historical past with 28,924 factors, No. 2 on the energetic record behind solely U.S. Olympic teammate LeBron James’ 40,474.
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“Nicely let me begin to (congratulate) @KDTrey5 as he will get prepared to interrupt one in all my Olympic information! The Slim Reaper!! Certainly one of my all time favorites!” Leslie wrote on X, the platform previously generally known as Twitter, final week because the perennial All-Star closed in on her mark.
And Durant is probably going going to maintain this report for a while.
He’s one in all solely 5 U.S. gamers with at the very least 300 factors in Olympic competitors, becoming a member of Leslie, WNBA profession scoring chief Diana Taurasi (416 coming into the U.S. girls’s quarterfinal recreation Wednesday), the retired Carmelo Anthony (336) and James, who’s presumably enjoying within the Olympics for the ultimate time and entered Tuesday with 316 factors in his 4 appearances.
“He’s one of the environment friendly gamers that ever performed this recreation,” U.S. teammate — and Phoenix Suns teammate — Devin Booker stated of Durant.
Durant can be the U.S. profession males’s chief in rebounds in Olympic play, coming into Tuesday with 126. He secured that report within the group-stage finale Saturday towards Puerto Rico, his 4 rebounds in that recreation permitting him to move each Anthony (125) and David Robinson (124) for the highest spot there.
Leslie stays — far and away — the profession chief in U.S. Olympic play for rebounding with 241 in her 32 video games.