The first half of the 2013-14 NBA season is in the books. At the midway point in the season, Oklahoma’s Kevin Durant leads the league in scoring with a 31.5 points per game (ppg) average. His closest competitor is the Knicks’ Carmelo Anthony at 27.3.

If the season ended today, the 4.2 scoring margin gap between Durant and Anthony would be the largest in the NBA since 2001-02 when Allen Iverson led the league with a 31.4 ppg and was followed by Shaquille O’Neal’s 27.2 (a 4.2 ppg margin).

In the history of the NBA, the ppg scoring margin gap between the scoring champ and runner-up has been over four points in 15 of the 67 seasons. The biggest gap was in the 1961-62 season when Wilt Chamberlain averaged 50.4 ppg on his way to the third consecutive of seven straight scoring titles. The runner-up in that 61-62 campaign was Walt Bellamy who averaged 31.6 that season.

Following is a look at the 10 largest ppg scoring gaps for the NBA scoring title.

PPG gap, Year, Scoring champ/runner-up
18.8… 1961-62, Wilt Chamberlain (50.4)/Walt Bellamy (31.6)
10.8… 1962-63, Wilt Chamberlain (44.8)/Elgin Baylor (34.0)
8.1… 1986, 87, Michael Jordan (37.1)/Dominique Wilkins (29.0)
6.7… 1950-51, George Mikan (28.4)/Alex Groza (21.7)
6.6… 1971-72, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (34.8)/Tiny Archibald (28.2)
6.4… 1946-47, Joe Fulks (23.2)/Bob Feerick (16.8)
6.4… 1959-60, Wilt Chamberlain (37.6)/Jack Twyman (31.2)
5.5… 1963-64, Wilt Chamberlain (36.9)/Oscar Robertson (31.4)
5.2… 1953-54, Neil Johnston (24.4)/Bob Cousy (19.2)
5.1… 1966-67, Rick Barry (35.6)/Oscar Robertson (30.5)

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