Golden State Warriors star Kevin Durant notched the 20,000th point of his NBA career in Wednesday's game against the Los Angeles Clippers at Oracle Arena.
LeBron James, Michael Jordan, Wilt Chamberlain and Kobe Bryant are the only other players to score 20,000 points before the age of 30.
The milestone points came on a jumper with 1:40 left in the first half. The Warriors shared a replay of the shot on Twitter:
During a break in the game, the Warriors fans showered the eight-time All-Star with cheers, via The Athletic's Anthony Slater:
LeBron James congratulated Durant on his achievement postgame as well, saying, "Congrats G on 20K!! Lots and lots of buckets! Easy too."
Prior to the game, Durant reflected on what the achievement would mean, per ESPN.com's Chris Haynes:
"Man, that's some great company, and there's so many names I never thought I'd be in the same conversation with. But to know -- to have it in numbers, in black and white -- to know that you belong in that group is pretty special to me. I'm telling you, man, it's never been a goal of mine to count how many points I have. That's not why I play the game. To be under 30 and do it, that's special to me too. You play in this league for so long, and having an opportunity to do something like this at this age, you just can't take it for granted, because there's not too many players on that list."
Although he hit 20,000 points, Durant needs 42 more to climb up the all-time scoring chart. He sits 44th in league history, with Antawn Jamison occupying the 43rd spot. Among active players, Durant is eighth in scoring, most closely trailing Joe Johnson (20,166 points).
By the time the 2017-18 season wraps up, Durant could overtake Hall of Famers David Robinson, George Gervin, Bob Pettit and Mitch Richmond in the record books. Pettit is 36th in all-time scoring with 20,880 points, and that's a more than achievable gap to close if Durant continues averaging around 25.9 points per game.
It will be fascinating to see how much Durant's move to Golden State will impact his ability to be one of the league's best all-time scorers from a statistical perspective.
Entering Wednesday, he was averaging two fewer points with the Warriors than he had in his nine years with the Oklahoma City Thunder. Over the span of an NBA career, those two points per game add up.
Of course, Durant will be more than happy to sacrifice his shot at Kareem Abdul-Jabbar's scoring record if it means adding another NBA title or two to his resume.
