The following post is an excerpt from Tres' Three Pointers. For the whole post, click here*
3) 3rd Quarter Kawhi!
After Game 2 of the NBA Finals, when the Warriors walked off the floor in Toronto with a 109-104 victory, I had two big thoughts. How will the Warriors play Game 3 with all of their injuries? And, will Kawhi attempt to control the tempo of the game like he did in the second half of Game 2?
I really started thinking about that second question at the end of the third when Kawhi shot five free throws to slow down the Warriors’ run and prevent Game 2 from being a blow out. I knew that Kawhi was a good second half scorer (he had shown that all throughout the playoffs), but I wasn’t sure if it was mainly the 3rd quarter or not. Then Kawhi had another great 3rd quarter in Game 3! He exemplified the meaning of a quiet 30 points as he poured in 15 of them in the 3rd quarter alone. So I started doing some research. My research confirmed my suspicion that the 3rd quarter of most games is Kawhi’s best quarter.
So why is that? I think there a combination of factors.
First, the third quarter is the most important quarter in basketball. It’s when both teams implement their first half adjustments, the game starts to slow down more, teams create leads, and teams cut into deficits. More often than not, how well a team plays in the third quarter, will tell you whether a team won that game or not. That’s why superstars usually end up scoring a good chunk of their points in the third quarter of a game.
Kawhi is no different in this respect. He has scored a total of 37 points in the 3rd quarters of these Finals (12.3 ppg in the 3rd). He’s averaging 53% from the floor and 44% from three. He also has zero turnovers in each 3rd quarter during the Finals. The only other player close to matching him is Steph Curry who averages 11.7 points per game in the 3rd quarter. This isn’t just a Finals thing either.
In the Conference Finals he averaged 10 points per game and scored 60 total. It wasn’t just because he played more games than anyone either. Steph scored 40 total at 10 per game and Giannis scored 37 total over six games. Kawhi blew both of these other superstars out of the water with his 3rd quarter scoring.
In the Semi-Finals against Philly, Kawhi shot 62% from three (that’s crazy) and averaged 10.7 points per game in the 3rd quarter! Overall, he’s averaging 10.8 points per game in the third quarter for the playoffs and he also averaged 7.6 in the regular season (5th overall).If you look at the last 10 years of the NBA playoffs (’09-‘19), the superstars of the league led the playoffs in 3rd quarter scoring every postseason.
Here’s the list of the leaders (minimum 12 playoff games):
09 – Kobe Bryant 8 points per game
10 – Kobe Bryant 9.1 points per game
11 – Derrick Rose 7.9 points per game
12 – Kevin Durant 8.5 points per game
13 – LeBron James 6.6 points per game
14 – LeBron James 8.8 points per game
15 – James Harden 7.5 points per game
16 – Russell Westbrook 8.5 points per game
17 – Stephen Curry 10.1 points per game
18 – Kevin Durant 9.3 points per game
19 – Kawhi Leonard 10.8 points per game
Here’s a graph of what that looks like and where Kawhi sits in comparison to everyone else.
Besides Curry in 2017, Kawhi is best scorer in the 3rd quarter by far and his team is winning as a result because of his ability to control the tempo and make the game be played at the pace that he wants to play at. An example of this is Kawhi’s free throw attempts. He’s shot a total of 17 free throws in the 3rd quarter and the next closest player is Steph Curry with only 9.
This shows me that Kawhi is driving to the paint and getting stops in play in order to take his opponents out of transition and then force them into playing the Raptors’ half court defense which has been amazing during these playoffs. Superstars all always have led the playoffs in scoring in the 3rd quarter so it's not just a coincidence that stars lead these scoring numbers. Usually superstars show out in the second half because they need to carry their team once opposing defenses starts to tighten up. Kawhi also appears to be the best at it.
*Stats and info taken from NBA.com
*Kawhi cover photo taken by Gregory Shamus/Getty Images