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June 8, 2012, 10:55 AM ET
Best High-Leverage LeBron Games

by Neil Paine

Was last night’s performance the best we’ve seen from LeBron in a high-leverage game?

Here were his best Hollinger Game Scores in games where the Championship Leverage was 2.00 or greater (meaning the game had at least twice as much impact on the outcome of the NBA championship as the average playoff game that season):

Date	Opp	Result	Min	Pts	TS%	Ast	Reb	Tov	S+B	GmSc	Lev
5/31/2007	at DET	W	50.3	48	61.3	7	9	2	2	38.1	3.14
6/7/2012	at BOS	W	44.8	45	75.1	5	15	4	0	36.4	2.83
5/18/2008	at BOS	L	46.8	45	60.2	6	5	2	2	32.8	2.67
5/24/2009	at ORL	L	42.0	41	53.2	9	7	2	3	31.3	2.04
5/26/2009	at ORL	L	49.4	44	59.6	7	12	8	2	27.9	2.16
5/24/2011	vs CHI	W	49.4	35	55.2	6	6	5	4	24.8	2.10
5/29/2007	vs DET	W	44.3	25	54.4	11	7	3	3	24.3	2.13
6/2/2007	vs DET	W	46.2	20	51.7	8	14	3	4	22.1	3.62
6/5/2012	vs BOS	L	45.3	30	52.6	2	13	3	3	21.9	2.45
5/31/2011	vs DAL	W	45.3	24	71.1	5	9	1	1	21.0	3.30
5/30/2009	at ORL	L	44.9	25	50.3	7	7	3	1	16.1	3.18
6/12/2007	vs SAS	L	42.0	25	47.1	7	8	5	3	15.9	3.01
5/21/2006	at DET	L	46.8	27	49.1	2	8	3	1	15.6	2.34
6/2/2011	vs DAL	L	39.6	20	59.7	4	8	5	5	15.6	3.41
6/12/2011	vs DAL	L	40.4	21	62.6	6	4	6	2	13.6	6.18
6/10/2007	at SAS	L	38.0	25	48.4	6	7	6	1	13.6	4.00
6/5/2011	at DAL	W	45.3	17	53.9	9	3	4	2	13.6	3.97
6/9/2011	at DAL	L	45.6	17	42.8	10	10	4	1	12.4	4.94
5/24/2007	at DET	L	44.7	19	43.0	7	6	6	3	11.0	2.00
6/7/2011	at DAL	L	45.7	8	31.3	7	9	4	2	5.9	3.62
6/7/2007	at SAS	L	44.0	14	39.4	4	7	6	2	5.0	3.87

(Leverage for 2012 is based on an estimate of the final playoff-wide average game swing, derived from the pre-Finals average.)

Not quite his greatest high-leverage outing ever (that honor still belongs to this masterpiece), but it was pretty close. We’ll see if he can do it again in Game 7, which is tracking to be the 3rd-most important game of James’ career.

Email Neil at np@sports-reference.com. Follow him on Twitter at @Neil_Paine.