We already forgot about KAT's big night

Karl-Anthony Towns just dropped 62 of the most forgettable points last night.

As Towns wrapped up his career high, he likely had no clue that a few hours earlier across the country, Joel Embiid thundered his way to an even more superlative night with 70 points. Eight mere points separate story A from story B, the lede from the “and also this happened”, the NBA equivalent of one caveman finding a new leaf while the other invents fire.

Poor Towns becomes a throw-in in the reporter’s question below and doesn’t even make the social copy for the NBA.

Towns’s big night didn’t even enjoy a single news cycle thanks to Embiid.

Overall, scoring is up as offenses thrive, but a simaulteanous explosion like this must be rare. Let’s see if this type of output ever happened on the same night.

A historic night for the league

Since the three-point era started in 1979, there’s only been twelve other nights in league history where two players scored over 50 points in the same night, per Stathead (who provide all the data for this post).

No pair outscored Towns and Embiid.

These unlucky thirteen paired nights form a fascinating cohort of NBA history. Within it, you’ll find poor Patrick Ewing, who had two 50+ masterpieces in 1990 fade away in the shadow of superior nights from Tom Chambers (60) and Charles Smith (52).

Even stranger, this is the third time Embiid stole the spotlight. First, he started slow by merely tying Jamal Murray—both players dropped 50 burgers on February 19th, 2021. On November 13th, 2022, Embiid notched his previous career high of 59 to win against Utah, outshining the 51 point breakout from Darius Garland that very night. Now, he strikes his former wrestling adversary from the record.

The man formerly known as Troel Embiid strikes again.

A rare double loss for Towns

Towns didn’t just pick an inopportune time to thrive; he also lost the game. In our list of games since 1979, the team with a player that scores 50+ points wins 73% of those games. Only Devin Booker (70 in a loss to Boston in 2017) and Michael Jordan (64 in an OT loss to the Magic in 1993) outscored Towns in a losing effort.

He ended the game +0 in a night he scored 62, a forgetful impact to the box score and likely to our memory at large.

Might be best to save your brilliance for when Embiid rests.