In the first year that the NBA Finals MVPaward was handed out, the trophy went to someone on the losing team. That player was Jerry West who averaged 37.9 points, 4.7 rebounds and 7.4 assists per game in a Finals series which saw the Boston Celtics winning in seven games. In those seven games, West put up one memorable performance after another. And while people may mostly remember the Game 7 triple-double where he scored 42 points, grabbed 13 boards and dished out 12 dimes, West's Game 1 outburst is the one that landed him in the record books...until Michael Jordan snatched it away.
In Game 1, West dropped 53 points in the Lakers' 120-118 win over the Celtics. That mark set a new record for the highest-scoring game by a guard in the NBA Finals. And like we said, it was a record that stood for 24 years until MJ scored 55 in the 1993 Finals against the Phoenix Suns.
