the 156-137 victory over the Utah Jazz<\/a> was a new franchise record for a rookie.<\/p>\n\u201cFor real?\u201d Fears asked. \u201cThat\u2019s crazy.\u201d<\/p>\n
Yes, Jeremiah. For real.<\/p>\n
And yes, that is crazy.<\/p>\n
But truth be told, there was a plenty of craziness on this record-setting night in the Pelicans home finale. We\u2019ll get to that later.<\/p>\n
First things first though.<\/p>\n
The 40 points eclipsed the previous rookie record of 37 points set by Marcus Thornton in the 2009-\u201910 season. Fears was just 3-years old when Thornton came off the bench and scored his 37 points in a road loss to the Cleveland Cavaliers. Fears\u2019 record-setting night came in a much-needed win, snapping the Pelicans\u2019 8-game slide.<\/p>\n
Fears shot 17-of-29 from the floor, but just made one of his seven 3-point attempts.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat was an impressive run by him,\u201d said Pelicans\u2019 interim head coach James Borrego. \u201cHe made just one 3-pointer. The rest, he\u2019s at the rim all night. He had three or four finishes that were elite finishes. At this young age to do that? The skill, the pace, the strength to go do this is elite.\u201d<\/p>\n
In addition to all the scoring, he also finished with six assists, five rebounds and three steals. That stat line also put him in some exclusive company. Over the last 10 years, the only other rookies to score 40 points with at least five assists and five rebounds are Victor Wembanyama, Anthony Edwards, Trae Young and Cooper Flagg.<\/p>\n
Fears nodded his head in approval and flashed a big smile as that exclusive list was read to him.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat feels really good,\u201d Fears said. \u201cThose guys obviously each and every night go out there and show everybody what they are capable of. They\u2019ve done some great stuff around the league. I know they are going to continue to do their thing. That\u2019s big time. That\u2019s huge.\u201d<\/p>\n
The elite company Fears joined didn\u2019t stop there. The 19-year old Fears became the eighth teenager in NBA history with a 40-point game. The others on that list reads like a Who\u2019s Who of basketball: LeBron James, Carmelo Anthony, Kevin Durant, Cliff Robinson, GG Jackson, Edwards and Flagg.<\/p>\n
Fears\u2019 previous career-high was 28 points. It was clear by halftime that he was going to top that. He had 20 through the first two quarters in a game Borrego sat most of his normal starters. For the home crowd wanting to see the stars like Zion Williamson, Trey Murphy and Saddiq Bey play one final home game, it was a bit of a disappointment. That disappointment flipped to excitement once Fears and Company came out the locker room for the second half. That’s when they started rewriting the record book.<\/p>\n
The Pelicans set franchise records for points in a quarter (50 in the third), points in a half (95) and points in a game (156). The team got a much deserved standing ovation at game\u2019s end.<\/p>\n
Now Fears gets to take his show on the road for the final two games of the season. The Pels play the Boston Celtics Friday and the Minnesota Timberwolves Sunday. You can best believe Fears will play in those last two games. He has played in all 80 games thus far, which probably shouldn\u2019t come as a surprise. Afterall, Fears hasn\u2019t missed a game since his freshman year of high school when he broke his thumb. He\u2019s been going strong since.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve been learning a lot throughout the season,\u201d Fears said. \u201cJust trying to get better each and every game. I think I\u2019ve been doing a good job with that.\u201d<\/p>\n
His coach would agree.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m really just proud of his growth,\u201d Borrego said. \u201cFrom training camp to where he\u2019s at today, he\u2019s taken a massive step. This franchise is in a really good place because of players like him. Fantastic.\u201d<\/p>\n
Fears doesn\u2019t recall scoring this many points in a game, but does recall a 55-point performance in middle school. His career-high at the University of Oklahoma last year was 31. None of that compare to what he did Tuesday.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a lot to wrap my head around,\u201d Fears said. \u201cBut it\u2019s huge.\u201d<\/p>\n
Everyone in the Smoothie King Center for the Pels\u2019 final home game would agree.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Chris Paul didn\u2019t do it. Neither did Anthony Davis nor Zion Williamson. In fact, no rookie who has…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":705033,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[3796],"tags":[7,6,478,470,4073,4072,675],"class_list":{"0":"post-705032","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-orleans-pelicans","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-nba","10":"tag-new-orleans","11":"tag-new-orleans-pelicans","12":"tag-neworleans","13":"tag-neworleanspelicans","14":"tag-pelicans"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116368665893746801","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/705032","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=705032"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/705032\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/705033"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=705032"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=705032"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=705032"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}