Phoenix Suns star Kevin Durant reacts to reaching career milestone

PHOENIX – The Phoenix Suns reached 2-1 on the season with a 114-102 win over the Dallas Mavericks on Saturday night – and a key player on the team also reached a historic milestone.

Kevin Durant became the eighth player in NBA history to reach 29,000 career points with a pull-up three-pointer midway through the fourth quarter, joining Wilt Chamberlain, Dirk Nowitzki, Michael Jordan, Kobe Bryant, Karl Malone, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and LeBron James in an extremely exclusive club.

Durant spoke about the momentous milestone after the game, reflecting with great appreciation and graciousness on a night that was supposed to be about the accomplishment.

“Since I've been here, I've reached a few milestones… I have to give credit to the people who have helped me since I was a kid, taught me the game, the teammates… I tend to think about them a lot…” “I'm grateful to have such great people in my life who help push me and lift me up when I needed it,” he said after the game.

Durant pointed out that he had previously overtaken Moses Malone, Carmelo Anthony and Shaquille O'Neal in scoring in a Suns jersey – and has been both an All-Star and All-NBA since being acquired by Phoenix in February 2022. selected selection.

Suns head coach Mike Budenholzer also praised Durant after the game:

“What a tribute to a great generational talent. I feel incredibly lucky to be around him every day…He gets to great places to shoot and score against sometimes really great defenses.”

Durant has continued to hold the title of arguably the league's best scorer even in his age-36 season, averaging 27.5 PPG on an absurd shooting line of 55.9/50/81.3 while seemingly thriving in Budenholzer's system was.

Durant's next goal is to overtake Chamberlain, who he currently trails by 2,409 points, for 7th place on the all-time scoring list. That will certainly take some time – until then, Phoenix should enjoy the time Durant spends here as he tries to bring the city a title for the first time ever.

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