The Six Craziest Stats From Portland And Denver’s Epic Four Overtime Game 3

Magic was in the air in the pacific northwest on Friday night, which bled into Saturday morning for much of the basketball watching world. The Portland Trail Blazers and the Denver Nuggets threw haymaker after haymaker in a four overtime epic at the Moda Center, one which Portland ended up winning, 140-137, to take a 2-1 series lead.

Somehow, the two teams are expected to get physically and mentally right and play a game at 4 p.m. PST on Sunday afternoon. Seeing as how everyone who stayed up to watch the entire thing will still be tired by that point, we here at Dime would like to formally wish both squads the best of luck as they try to play a high-stakes basketball game. Before we get to that point, though, we wanted to celebrate one of the weirdest box scores you will ever see.

Below are six things that stuck out after going over the numbers for the longest playoff overtime game in 66 years.

1. Two players racked up at least an hour on the floor

For Portland, it was C.J. McCollum, who had a whale of a game. The Blazers’ standout guard was great during regulation, but morphed into a flamethrower during the four extra periods — of his 41 points, 18 of them came in the game’s additional 20 minutes. In overtime, McCollum went 8-for-19 from the field, and did not get substituted out.

Denver responded by having Nikola Jokic play so much basketball. The lumbering big man played 65 minutes — it’s officially 64:58, but 65 sounds way cooler. According to basketball-reference, here is the list of players who have played at least 64 minutes in a game, dating as far back as their database goes:

Bob Cousy
Dale Ellis
Sleepy Floyd
Xavier McDaniels
Norm Nixon
Red Rocha
Paul Seymour

The last time it happened was in 1989, when Ellis (69 minutes) and McDaniels (68 minutes) did it in the same game, a five overtime affair in which their Seattle SuperSonics lost to the Milwaukee Bucks, 155-154. Jokic is also the only player to play 64+ minutes in a playoff game outside of Cousy, Rocha, and Seymour, who all did it in a four overtime game between the Boston Celtics and Syracuse Nationals in 1953.

We’ll get to Jokic’s numbers in a bit, but one more note about how much he played: Per ESPN, Jokic recorded more minutes in a playoff game than any other seven footer ever.

2. Will Barton and Rodney Hood came up huge in OT

Oftentimes in overtime, you need someone to give you a shot in the arm as your collective legs are getting heavier and heavier. Both teams managed to get this out of someone. Denver turned to Will Barton, while Rodney Hood made the most of when his number was called late.

It took a while for Barton to get cooking, but to his credit, he was really, really good during overtime. Here is how his evening broke down:

Regulation: 19:08, 4-for-10 shooting, 10 points, four rebounds, two assists, one steal, one block
Overtime: 19:29, 4-for-8 shooting, 12 points, five rebounds, one assist, two blocks, one steal

Michael Malone rolled eighty percent of his starting five — Jamal Murray, Gary Harris, Paul Millsap, Jokic — out for much of overtime, but gave Barton the lion’s share of the minutes over fifth starter Torrey Craig. It was a pretty good decision, as Barton just looked bouncier than the rest of his teammates.

Hood, meanwhile, waited and waited for his shot. He came in as a substitute for Enes Kanter in the first overtime, played 31 seconds, then chilled on the bench until the fourth overtime. Once there, he played 1:44 and scored seven of Portland’s 11 points in the frame, including a go-ahead triple with 18 seconds remaining.

For a guy whose reputation wasn’t exactly sterling following last year’s stint with the Cleveland Cavaliers, this is a really cool moment for Hood.

3. Lots of shots

Portland let it fly 124 times. Denver responded by shooting 119 times. Here is the list of teams that have done this in the playoffs, dating back to 1983-84:

1. Them
2. The 1993 Chicago Bulls in a three overtime loss to the Phoenix Suns

Pretty good! The list of teams that have done this in the regular season is a bit longer, and not only is this not the first time we’ve seen 119+ FGA by a team in a game this year, it’s not even the first time we’ve seen two teams do it in the same game during the 2018-19 campaign. Obviously the stakes were a touch higher here than they were during the hilarious four overtime contest between the Bulls and the Atlanta Hawks back in March, but like Friday’s affair, that game was a delight.

4. YGTMTFY

As basketball Twitter loves to remind everyone, you got to make your free throws. The Blazers took two free throws in overtime. Both were by Seth Curry, they came with 2.8 seconds left, he hit them both, and they iced the game. They were his first, and only, points that he hit other than a three-pointer in the opening minute of the second quarter. Children, always be ready.

5. Two more things on McCollum

First, he shot it 19 times in overtime! That’s crazy! He took 19 shots in a game 32 times this season. He was put in a position where he had to do that in 20 additional minutes. It is extremely hard to shoot 19+ times in 20 or fewer minutes — since the turn of the century, the delightfully weird list of players who have done this are Zydrunas Ilgauskus in 2002, Michael Beasley in 2009 and 2016, and Aron Baynes last year. Beasley, as an aside, is the one of two players to do this twice, the other is former ’60s journeyman Bob Warlick. Basketball is a strange sport.

Anyway, while I would love to spend the rest of this space discussing Michael Beasley, here’s that second McCollum thing.

No human has ever deserved to sleep in on a Saturday more than McCollum does. I hope he is still getting shut eye right now. Oh, and also, his 39 field goal attempts for the entire game is a career-high.

6. 30-15-10

And now, all the players who have recorded at least 30 points, 15 rebounds, and 10 assists in a playoff game before Friday night:

Kareem Abdul-Jabbar
Charles Barkley
Wilt Chamberlain (2x)
Oscar Robertson (3x)
Ralph Sampson
James Worthy

Jokic, who has a penchant for putting up ridiculous box scores, joined that list with his 33-point, 18-rebound, 14-assist outing on Friday. It’s not all good though, because other than Kareem and Wilt, everyone who had one of those games won. Ouch.