19 years ago today: Kevin Durant’s NBA debut brings 18 points on 7-of-22 shooting in a 120-103 Sonics loss at Denver

Nineteen years ago today, on Halloween night in 2007, a 19-year-old from the Washington suburbs made his NBA debut for the Seattle SuperSonics in Denver. Kevin Durant scored 18 points on 7-of-22 shooting in 31 minutes, and the Nuggets won the season opener for both teams, 120-103.

It was not a great night, and Durant was the first to say so. But it was the first of more than 1,200 regular-season games, and the start of a scoring career that only four players in NBA history have topped. It was also the first game of the final season the SuperSonics would ever play in Seattle.

A free throw, an airball and a layup

Durant was 19 years and 32 days old and still nursing an ankle he had sprained eight days earlier. Coach P.J. Carlesimo started him at shooting guard, and he scored his first NBA point at the free-throw line about a minute and a half into the game. Two minutes later he airballed a short jumper in the lane. His first basket, a driving layup, did not come until late in the first quarter.

Carmelo Anthony spent much of the night guarding him and the rest of it scoring on him. Anthony finished with 32 points, Allen Iverson had 25 points, 14 assists and 7 steals, and Denver pulled away by winning the fourth quarter 34-22.

“I’m always hard on myself even if I played well,” Durant said afterward. “My team did a great job of getting me some open shots. I need to knock them down. I had a lot of open shots I should have knocked down.”

The box score at the Pepsi Center

• Final: Denver Nuggets 120, Seattle SuperSonics 103, in front of 19,380 fans on Wednesday, October 31, 2007.
• By quarter: Seattle 31-27-23-22; Denver 35-24-27-34.
• Kevin Durant: 18 points (7-22 FG, 2-7 3P, 2-4 FT), 5 rebounds, 3 steals, 1 assist and 1 block in 31:34, and a minus-8.
• SuperSonics: Damien Wilkins led Seattle with 21 points, Delonte West scored 19 off the bench and Chris Wilcox added 14. Nick Collison had 8 points and 11 rebounds.
• Nuggets: Anthony scored 32 on 10-of-21 shooting, Iverson 25, Linas Kleiza 18 with five 3-pointers, and Marcus Camby grabbed 15 rebounds with 5 blocks.

A rebuilt roster around a rookie

The Sonics had reshaped everything around the second overall pick that summer. On draft night they traded Ray Allen to Boston for Delonte West, Wally Szczerbiak and the fifth pick, Jeff Green, and Rashard Lewis left for Orlando. All three newcomers from the Allen trade played in Durant’s debut. Green, also making his first NBA appearance, scored 5 points.

The veterans in Denver were impressed anyway. “It’s tough when you have to start off your first game against Carmelo Anthony,” Iverson said. “The future is bright for him and the sky’s the limit for him. He’s going to be great.”

Anthony asked for patience. “He’s going to be all right,” he said. “I’ve been in that situation. I hope nobody puts too much pressure on him.” Then he added: “I know a lot of people didn’t expect him to look that good. He showed us a lot out there.”

Carlesimo kept it short. “I thought he played all right for a 19-year-old kid playing his first game,” he said. “It ain’t about how individuals play. It’s how our team played. We got beat.”

Seattle’s last season

Seattle lost its first eight games. The first win of Durant’s career came at Miami on November 14, and two nights later in Atlanta he hit his first game-winner, a 3-pointer in a 126-123 double-overtime victory.

15 years ago today… Kevin Durant buried the game-winning triple as a rookie! pic.twitter.com/SCmJUoOXTB

— NBA History (@NBAHistory) November 16, 2022

• Season line: 80 games, all starts, 20.3 points, 4.4 rebounds and 2.4 assists in 34.6 minutes, shooting 43.0% from the field and 87.3% from the line.
• First 30-point game: 35 points in a 95-93 home win over Indiana on November 30, 2007.
• Revenge on Denver: 37 points, 9 assists and 8 rebounds in a 151-147 double-overtime win over the Nuggets on April 6, 2008.
• The last Sonics game: 42 points and 13 rebounds in a 126-121 win at Golden State on April 16, 2008. Seattle finished 20-62, and that summer the franchise moved to Oklahoma City and became the Thunder.
• Rookie of the Year: Durant won with 90 of 125 first-place votes and 545 points. Atlanta’s Al Horford was second (30 first-place votes, 390 points) and Houston’s Luis Scola third.

From 18 points to 32,597

Durant entered this season with 32,597 regular-season points, fifth in NBA history behind LeBron James, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Karl Malone and Kobe Bryant. He passed Michael Jordan’s 32,292 last season and is 1,046 points behind Bryant. In his second season with Houston, he scored 30 in a 128-110 win over Dallas on October 21.

Along the way he has played for the Sonics, Thunder, Warriors, Nets, Suns and Rockets, won the 2014 MVP, four scoring titles and two championships with two Finals MVP awards, and made 16 All-Star teams. At 37 last season, he still averaged 26.0 points on 52.0% shooting.

Now 38 and in his 19th season on the court, Durant has a career scoring average of 27.1 points a game. It started with a free throw, an airball and a 7-of-22 night in Denver, 19 years ago tonight.