Kawakami: Klay Thompson’s 60-point night and…

In Toronto LeBron James scored 34 points as the Cleveland Cavaliers snapped their 3-game losing streak with a hard-fought 116-112 win over the Raptors, a repeat of last season’s Eastern Conference Finals showdown.

Klay Thompson scored a career-high 60 points on 21-33 shooting on Monday night as the Golden State Warriors walloped the Indiana Pacers, 142-106. But here’s the insane part: He sat the entire fourth quarter.

He’d need 67 points in those 29 minutes to be on pace, and he would’ve got there by nailing two more threes and sinking his one missed free throw before his 29 minutes were up.

Thompson shot 21-of-33 and made 8-of-14 from beyond the arc, five more triples than the entire IN team, while adding 10 free throws. Instead, Thompson’s points came within the flow of Golden State’s offense.

Thompson’s 60-point night was as exciting as they come.

OAKLAND, Calif. (AP) – Klay Thompson wanted one more quarter. It reached a boiling point after Game 7 at Staples, where several players from both teams enaged in verbal confrontations in the hallway between the locker rooms. Then again, Thompson is playing with the likes of Kevin Durant, Stephen Curry, and Kicks McGee-and isn’t saddled with starters like Smush Parker, Chris Mihm, and Kwame Brown.

So Thompson, in the midst of absolutely torching the Pacers in the second quarter, ran to the corner in front of the Golden State Warriors’ bench.

Watch video highlights of Klay Thompson scoring 60pts against the Pacers, as the Warriors ran away 142-106 in the National Basketball Association on Monday night. The most recent 60-point explosion by a Warrior was Barry’s 64-point game in 1974.

“Maybe. I think I could have, maybe one day I’ll have the opportunity”. Thompson made 21 of 32 shots, including eight 3-pointers as he became just the second Golden State Warrior to score 60 points in a game.

“Good question”, a smiling Thompson said.

Golden State and LA enter this game on opposite sides in points in the paint per game. The Clips recently had a two-game win streak snapped by the Indiana Pacers at home, 111-102. “For us, we’ve just got to, especially [given] the fact that we lost last the last game, hopefully get this practice to get stuff right defensively”. They are 2 in point differential (+9.6) by virtue of their 108.8 ppg (6) and points allowed at 99.1 (6).

His 40 points in the first half were the most by anyone before intermission since the Lakers’ Kobe Bryant had 42 points against the Wizards on March 28, 2003.

The most any Pacers player has scored in franchise history was 57, by Reggie Miller against the Charlotte Hornets on November 28, 1992.