Luka Doncic has 308 points in eight games. Only Wilt Chamberlain has scored more in the first eight games of a season, and he did it three times, topping out at 418 in 1962-63. The last person to clear 300 was Michael Jordan, with 303 in 1988-89, per the Associated Press, and the game logs for Jordan and Chamberlain on Basketball Reference add up. Jordan’s eighth game was a 52-pointer against Philadelphia. Doncic’s was Wednesday’s 40 in Sacramento.
Doncic is not going to keep making 43.1% of his threes, and he is not going to stay at 89.3% at the line. Both numbers are well above anything he has done for a full season. The part of this start that should excite Lakers fans is the volume. He is taking more threes than ever and getting to the line more than he did last season, and if the percentages fall all the way back to last season’s, he still scores more than he did when he led the league.
Sacramento was the formula in one night
The 116-103 win over the Kings was his third straight 40-point game and sixth straight of at least 35. He went 11-for-23 from the floor, 6-for-13 from three and 12-for-13 at the line, with nine rebounds and seven assists in 35 minutes, per ESPN’s box score. He scored 10, 13 and 12 over the first three quarters and only needed five in the fourth.
That’s 18 of his 40 from three and 12 from the line. Only 10 came on twos. For the season, 92 of his 308 points have come on twos.
It was also not a clean night. He turned it over six times, which puts him at 41 turnovers in eight games, or 5.1 a game. I wrote after the Utah game that ball security was the real story of the 52-point night, and they have crept back, with seven against Toronto and six on Wednesday around a two-turnover night against Miami. There was also a strange moment late in the third quarter, when a fan seated near the baseline threw the ball hard at official Chelisa Painter. Doncic pointed the fan out, and security removed him, per the AP.
One more note from that box score, since I spent Wednesday telling the Lakers to let Darius Acuff Jr. shoot. Acuff went 8-for-24 and 3-for-11 from three. The part about boxing out Domantas Sabonis went less well: 17 rebounds, six of them offensive.
The shooting that won’t last
Here are Doncic’s numbers through eight games, adding Wednesday’s box score to his Basketball Reference game log:
- 47-for-109 from three, 43.1%
- 75-for-84 at the line, 89.3%
- 46-for-79 on twos, 58.2%
Now compare that with his career page. He made 36.6% of his threes last season. His best full season was 38.2% in 2023-24, and his career mark entering this year was 35.2%. At the line, he was a 78.0% shooter last season and 75.5% for his career before this season. A 43% three-point season on this many attempts would be unlike anything he has done.
So run it back with last season’s percentages and the same shot attempts. At 36.6% on 109 threes, he makes about 40 instead of 47, which costs him 21 points. At 78.0% on 84 free throws, he makes about 65 or 66 instead of 75, roughly nine and a half more. His twos are close to normal already (57.5% last season), so that’s about a point. Take all of that off and he lands around 276 points in eight games.
That’s about 34.5 points a game. He led the league with 33.5 last season.
The volume is what changed
That cooled-off number is still a career high because the shot diet moved. Doncic is taking 13.6 threes a game, up from 10.8 last season, which was already his career high. Through seven games, 58.2% of his field goal attempts came from three, per Basketball Reference. Last season it was 47.6%. He is taking fewer twos, 9.9 a game against 11.9 last year.
He is getting to the line a bit more, too. He is at 10.5 free-throw attempts a game, up from 10.1 last season. In Sacramento the whole team got there, 34-for-38, with Reaves 6-for-6.
The minutes didn’t drive any of this. He played 35.8 minutes a game last season and was at 35.7 through seven games. His usage rate is up a little, 39.4% after seven games against 38.1% last season. The extra points come from where the shots are taken. A three is worth more than a two, and a trip to the line with two free throws is worth more than a contested floater. Fewer of his shots are twos, more are threes, and more of his possessions end at the line.
That’s the trade I’d make every night. When he isn’t making the threes, a 36% three on 13 attempts a game still beats a 50% floater on the same number of shots. Where it gets dicey is on the nights when the threes go cold and the turnovers pile up, the way they did against the Clippers on Oct. 23, when he went 2-for-8 from three with 11 turnovers and scored 23.
What I’d watch from here
The Lakers are 7-2, and 6-2 in the games he has played. Both losses came on nights he scored 37 or more. The 40s are fun. They don’t decide every game, and they won’t keep coming at this rate.
The two numbers I’d follow over the next month are his three-point attempts and his free-throw attempts. If he keeps taking 13 or more threes and getting 10 free throws a night, the scoring holds up even when the percentage drops into the 30s. If the attempts drift back toward last season’s mix, the 38.5 a game will go with it.
The other thing is the workload. He was averaging 35.7 minutes through seven games, and I argued before the season that the Lakers should cap him at 34. Nothing in this start changes my mind. An MVP case is made over 65 games, and that was the point of my answer to Draymond Green last month. A 34.5-a-night Doncic who plays 70 games is a better MVP candidate than a 38-a-night Doncic who plays 60.
Portland visits Los Angeles on Friday. The Blazers already beat the Lakers once, 136-129, on a night Doncic scored 41. The threes might cool off by then. I’ll be counting how many he takes.