5. LeBron’s 50-Piece (2018 NBA Finals, Game 1)
The 2018 NBA Finals were seemingly over before they even got underway with everyone picking the Warriors to dispose of the vastly overmatched Cleveland Cavaliers team. And yes, they did end up sweeping them.
However, the Cavs were a few seconds, a single missed free throw and a blunder of epic proportions away from a Game 1 win on the road.
And there is only one reason they even found themselves in that position, to begin with…
This was arguably the best game of LeBron’s career who torched the Dubs for 51 points. He single-handedly kept them in the game the whole way and he still had enough left in the tank to sustain his unstoppable play into crunch time where he hit a seemingly impossible and-1 layup to put the Cavs up in the closing moments.
But then it just went downhill from there…
First, there was a blatant missed charge call on LeBron and then George Hill missed a free throw that would have given them the lead with a few seconds left and then J.R. Smith grabbed the offensive rebound, forgot the score and the series was over from there.
With all that being said and even with the way the Finals went from Game 1 onwards, this was still one of the truly great performances we’ve seen on basketball’s biggest stage.