Watching a superstar like Kobe Bryant explode for 81 points is fun. It was, after all, one of the greatest scoring performances the NBA has ever seen. Watching him do it against your favorite team and hand out a loss in the process isn’t quite as much fun. After all, no one wants to be the team that lets go of a lead and allows someone score an ungodly amount of points. It’s just not a good look. After all, it’s incredibly unlikely that anyone scores that many points in a game. When it happens, it certainly doesn’t speak to the opposition’s defensive prowess.
Thanks to Bam Adebayo, Raptors fans have to relive that game over and over again. Adebayo scored 83 points against the Washington Wizards last night. He is now second on the single-game scoring list, trailing only Wilt Chamberlain. So, of course, everyone is comparing his historic performance to when Kobe Bryant was single-handedly taking apart the Raptors—including some arguments on X about how much better than this season’s Wizards team the Raptors really were back then. With everyone on social media and any NBA-related podcast, show, or TV program talking about it, there’s no way for Raptors fans to escape the constant reminders.
It took 20 years for someone to exceed Kobe’s 81 points
That fateful loss to the Lakers was 20 years ago. On January 22, 2006, the Raptors rolled out a starting lineup of Jalen Rose, Chris Bosh, Mike James, Morris Peterson, and Matt Bonner to face off with the Lakers.
Kobe Bryant took 46 shots, including 13 3-pointers, and 20 free throws. He made 28 of his field-goal attempts and 18 of his shots from the charity stripe. He was efficient on his way to a historic 81 points.
Since then, several players have scored at least 70 points. Devin Booker did it in 2017. In 2023, Donovan Mitchell and Damian Lillard both scored 71 points. A year later, Joel Embiid scored 70 and Luka Doncic recorded 73 points in a 148-143 win over the Hawks. Until Adebayo’s 83-point performance, Doncic was the latest player to even come close to Kobe’s 81 points.
Adebayo isn’t usually a big-time scorer. He only averaged 20 points for a whole season once. Nevertheless, he was unstoppable against the Wizards. He took 43 shots, 22 of which came from behind the arc, and 43 free throws. He converted a little less than 50% of his field-goal attempts and shot over 80% from the free-throw line.
The way Adebayo got his 83 points will always be a point of contention, especially compared to Kobe’s performance, but no one can take away his spot in NBA history and he deserves a ton of respect for what he did.
Adebayo’s historic night also has implications for the current Raptors
Adebayo’s 83 points propelled the Heat to a blowout win over the Wizards. With that win, the Heat waltzed into the top six in the Eastern Conference and evaporated the small lead the Raptors had over them. Both teams are now 10 games behind the Pistons, who comfortably occupy the top seed in the Eastern Conference.
As if that wasn’t bad enough already, the Magic are only 0.5 games behind the Raptors and Heat.
Toronto lost another game to a good team last night, falling to the Houston Rockets. Their margin of error continues to get smaller and smaller with every single game.