You've heard the maxim before: The NBA is a make or miss league. But it's never been more true than in these playoffs. As the best basketball league in the world leans further and further into 3-point shooting, success from beyond the arc is increasingly deciding who wins the highest-stakes games to a drastic degree.
Consider this: For the first time in NBA history, 3-point shooters are outscoring paint scorers. Coming into Tuesday's games, playoff scorers had yielded 4,602 points via 3s and 4,512 points in the paint. This fact is more than just trivia.