Welcome to Triple-Double Watch, a weekly check-in on everyone’s favorite arbitrary milestone of round, base-ten numbers.
The basketball world shifted its focus toward March Madness over the past few weeks to get its annual fill of single-elimination drama, underdog magic, and glimpses of the next talent wave to grace the NBA. It all crested with the league loaning the entire spotlight to the NCAA for Monday night’s championship showdown and scheduling no games of its own. Even on a short week, we still got a foursome of triple-doubles.
Jrue Holiday parachutes into the column for his first appearance of the season. His 21-point, 11-rebound, 11-assist triple-double in a losing effort against Portland marks the third of his career. Holiday’s last one came all the way back on Jan. 2, 2013 during his lone all-star campaign and final season with Philadelphia.
Holiday’s talent has never been in question, but he’s been marred by injuries throughout his time in the NBA. He’s finally enjoying *knocks on wood* a healthy year, playing in all but one game for New Orleans and putting up career-high averages in points (19.0), rebounds (4.5), and blocks (0.8). They need him now more than ever to cling to one of the West’s ultimate playoff spots.
The top three triple-doublers all packed on one more to their totals.
The 76ers are the hottest team in the league, winners of 10 straight. Their upstart success this season has been shouldered by wunderkinds Ben Simmons and Joel Embiid. Now with Embiid out with a fractured orbital bone, Simmons will need to shepherd Philadelphia to the playoffs for the final stretch. In the first full game of Embiid’s absence, Simmons produced a triple-double against the Hawks in only 27 minutes. Then in Charlotte, the ROY frontrunner missed another one by two rebounds, putting up 20 points and 15 dimes. So far, so good.
There’s never a dull moment in Cleveland, as the Cavaliers wrestled with inconsistency, off-court turmoil, and major roster turnover. Despite all this (or possibly because of) LeBron James is composing his finest season yet (don’t @ me). After ebbs and flows, the team is rounding into postseason form at the right time, going 8-2 over their last 10 contests. Even in a poor shooting performance, James slapped up an April Fool’s Day triple-double for his 17th of the year.
Next: Following the Pelicans through five games in six days
Lastly, we wrap up with none other than the avant guard, Russell Westbrook. Westbrook inches closer to averaging a triple-double on the season, now ticking up to 9.8 rebounds per game. If he ascends to that magical double-digit plateau over the four remaining games, he’ll be the first player to ever achieve the feat in multiple seasons.