Rick Carlisle
January 2026
Carlisle became the 11th NBA coach to reach 1,000 wins after Indiana beat Charlotte 114-112, ending a brutal month that included a 13-game losing streak. Indiana closed the final minute with key plays including a Siakam go-ahead finish and a steal after. Carlisle credited players for grinding through injuries and setbacks, emphasising standards and adaptability across eras.
Steve Kerr
January 2026
Kerr said his 91-year-old mother was upset by his ejection after he received two technicals during a one-point loss to the Clippers. Kerr explained the scene looked worse than it was, with players holding him back. Curry backed the spark it gave the team, while Rivers joked Kerr acted badly and shared a similar story.
Jose Alvarado, Mark Williams
December 2025
Jose Alvarado was suspended two games without pay and Mark Williams one game without pay after an altercation in Suns vs Pelicans. Both were ejected after punches were thrown following a foul and shove sequence late in the third quarter. The conflict began with Alvarado committing a defensive foul and Williams responding with a shove, before escalation into a fight that led to technical fouls and ejections. The league assigned suspension dates tied to upcoming Pelicans and Suns fixtures immediately following the incident.
Russell Westbrook
December 2025
Russell Westbrook climbed to seventh on the NBA’s all-time assists list, passing Magic Johnson with his 10,142nd dime and finishing the night on 10,149. He also recorded his 2,000th career steal, becoming only the 14th player in league history to reach that mark. The Kings guard, a former MVP and three-time assists leader, now has realistic chances to leapfrog Mark Jackson and Steve Nash this season, while also chasing Mookie Blaylock and Karl Malone in career steals. The double milestone underlines his long-term playmaking and defensive impact despite changing roles late in his career.
Jaylen Brown
December 2025
Jaylen Brown has scored 30 points in eight straight games, a feat only matched once in Celtics history by Larry Bird’s nine-game run in 1985, while averaging 29.4 points this season and leading Boston to a 6-2 record during his current scoring explosion. Brown poured in 30 points on ultra-efficient shooting against Indiana, following a season-high 42 earlier in the streak. Despite modest three-point volume, he is hitting over 50 percent from the field and repeatedly carrying Boston’s attack, putting him on the verge of tying Bird’s iconic club mark.
Blake Griffin, Candace Parker
December 2025
Blake Griffin, Candace Parker, Jamal Crawford and the 1996 U.S. Olympic women’s team headline the first-time nominees for the 2026 Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame class. Elena Delle Donne, Joe Johnson and coach Mike D’Antoni also feature on a deep opening ballot. The Hall praised the candidates’ defining performances and global impact, noting that finalists will be named at NBA All-Star weekend, with the class officially unveiled at the men’s Final Four. Enshrinement weekend is scheduled for mid August 2026 in Connecticut and Springfield, Massachusetts.
NBA
December 2025
Gravity is a new metric that quantifies how much extra defensive attention a player draws on and off the ball versus what floor spacing predicts. Using tracking data, it compares expected defensive pressure to the actual attention a player pulls, producing a differential score from -100 to 100. The system ingests 3D pose data from every player 60 times per second, learning how defenders usually react in specific ball and player locations. When multiple defenders shade or over-help toward a particular scorer, their Gravity spikes above zero, exposing who truly bends the defense, opens lanes and creates value even without touching the ball.
NBA
December 2025
The NBA has introduced Gravity, a new stat that quantifies how much defensive attention an offensive player draws relative to expected pressure based on floor spacing, turning previously subjective notions of off ball threat and defensive distortion into a standardized number on a minus one hundred to one hundred scale. Using optical tracking and 3D pose data captured sixty times per second, a machine learning model compares the pressure a player should face in a given position to the pressure actually applied, producing a Gravity differential that reveals who truly bends defenses, creates space, and boosts teammates even without touching the ball.
Kevin Durant, James Harden
December 2025
Kevin Durant and James Harden face each other in Houston for the first time as simultaneous top-10 all-time scorers, days after Durant passed 31,000 points and Harden climbed above Carmelo Anthony into 10th on the NBA’s career list. Harden’s late-career scoring surge after his Houston explosion years now has him chasing Shaquille O’Neal for ninth, while Durant’s sustained efficiency gives him a realistic shot at moving past Wilt Chamberlain, Dirk Nowitzki and even Michael Jordan if he maintains his current output.
Kevin Durant
December 2025
Kevin Durant became the eighth player in NBA history to reach 31,000 career points, hitting the milestone with a first-quarter jumper against the Suns after earlier free throws, continuing his late-career scoring excellence in his first season with the Houston Rockets. Durant achieved 31,000 points in his 1,141st game, matching LeBron James for the third-fewest games needed behind Michael Jordan and Wilt Chamberlain. The 37-year-old now sits in an elite group that includes Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Karl Malone, Kobe Bryant and Dirk Nowitzki.
