LA Clippers star Russell Westbrook joined the 25,000 points club on Friday night against the Detroit Pistons, becoming the 25th player in NBA history to do so. The player who most recently joined the club before Westbrook is his teammate James Harden. With Westbrook reaching the milestone on Friday night, he and Harden became the only teammates in NBA history to join the 25,000 points club in the same season.
With very similar careers, both Harden and Westbrook have an MVP award and several other accolades that closely mirror each other. Westbrook has nine All-NBA selections, nine All-Star appearances, three assist titles, and two scoring titles. Harden has seven All-NBA selections, 10 All-Star appearances, two assist titles, and three scoring titles.
Harden also has a 6th Man of the Year award, which Westbrook is in the running for this season. Harden's 6th Man of the Year award came as a backup guard on a team Westbrook started for, and now it's Westbrook coming off the bench for a team Harden starts for.
With very similar careers, Harden and Westbrook are playing together for the third time, but their connection goes even further back than the OKC Thunder days. When Harden first joined the Clippers, he said, "I've been knowing Russ since we were kids at the Boys and Girls club in LA. Our relationship goes far beyond basketball. Of course he was one of the reasons [I wanted to come to the Clippers]."
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