LeBron James struggled from three-point range this past Saturday night in Salt Lake City. In a 94-89 loss to the Jazz, the Miami Heat superstar missed on five of his six attempts from beyond the arc and scored a season-low 13 points. This performance continues a disturbing trend for James, who is now shooting a rather pedestrian 35.8 percent from three-point territory.
While this is not necessarily the end of the world, James was much more accurate from the land of plenty last season, shooting a robust 40.6 percent. Actually, with the exception of field goal percentage, James’ numbers are down across the board. Of course, these numbers are still impressive, but down nonetheless. However, the long distance shooting is the most obvious statistic. Fatigue is likely not an issue as James is currently averaging a career-low in minutes per game .
Miami was just out of sync in general against Utah, shooting 43.3 percent from the field as a team. LeBron touched on this fact in his post-game remarks:
“I think offensively we were not in rhythm all night,” James said. “We had some great looks, including myself, we had some really open looks. It’s just one of those games where offensively you’re out of rhythm and you just try to win it defensively.”
Since the beginning of the season, James’ three-point shooting has been in a veritable freefall, with his percentage declining further each month. For January, James was at an ugly 27.5 percent, and February has actually been worse, with LeBron currently shooting 26.3 percent from three-point land for the month.
The rest of the league has clearly noticed this trend, as Utah was giving LeBron plenty of room to fire from long distance. Some would argue that James should be driving to the basket more and initiating contact as he is generally difficult to stop in these situations. However, when compared to last season, James’ free throw attempts per game are up, so this theory may not necessarily be accurate.
LeBron is far from panicked , and is optimistic for the rest of the season:
“I’ve been shooting, but obviously it hasn’t been going in,” James explained. “But I feel comfortable every time I take it, so you just got to knock them down. I’m in a little funk from outside the three-point line, but I’ll get back to it.”
LeBron and the Heat, sporting the second best record in the Eastern Conference to date, are currently in the midst of a five game road swing before returning home on February 23 rd against Chicago.