LeBron James has been a phenom in professional basketball ever since he was drafted in the 2003 Draft by his hometown Cleveland Cavaliers. However, nobody expected how quickly LeBron would change the fortunes of his franchise, one of the poorest performing franchises in NBA history.
LeBron would lead the Cavaliers to the 2005-06 playoffs with a 50-win record, good for the fourth seed in the East. The Cavaliers would beat the Washington Wizards in the first round, a series where the Cavaliers were expected to lose to the better-rounded Wizards led by Gilbert Arenas, but LeBron infamously psyched Arenas out and led his Cavs to a series win in 6 games.
The next round brought the five-time reigning Conference Champions Detroit Pistons in the second round, where the Cavaliers did fail. However, it was a seven-game series that nobody expected to see go that long. But it did, all because LeBron James was unstoppable.
Prime Ben Wallace couldn’t do anything with 21 year-old LeBron (2006 Playoffs) pic.twitter.com/2euX05wVsw
— LeBron History 🏀 (@bronhistory) April 8, 2022
The Pistons were an all-time great defensive team, with their anchor being Ben Wallace, who won his fourth Defensive Player of the Year trophy that season. However, the highlights show that LeBron was not scared of any of the Pistons, including Wallace.
LeBron averaged 26.6 points, 8.6 rebounds, 6.0 assists, 1.4 steals, and 0.7 blocks over the seven-game series. While these points may appear low considering the modern standards of scoring in the playoffs, the most points the Cavaliers scored this series was 91 points in a Game 2 loss to the Pistons. The Cavaliers put up just 61 points as a team in an elimination Game 7, with LeBron being responsible for 27 of those.
The outmatched Cavaliers would become the favorites in 2007 and get their playoff revenge on the Pistons, with LeBron having a historic performance in Game 5 of the 2007 Eastern Conference Finals.
