With less than nine minutes left on the clock against the Utah Jazz, a trademark skyhook shot from the Los Angeles Lakers’ giant centre moved him onto 31,420 points in the NBA and into the history books as the league’s highest-ever scorer.

The game stopped as team-mates and opposition players rushed over to greet him,

while the 18,000 fans in the Thomas and Mack Center at the University of Nevada rose to a standing ovation. Abdul-Jabbar, 37 at the time, was then taken out of the game.

His 38,387 points tally upon retirement in 1989 is still the record.

Watch the highlights of some of the moments of his illustrious career

Here’s what other memorable events happened on this day:

1904: First international rugby league match sees England lose 9-3 to ‘Other Nationalities’ side.

1946: Outsider Lovely Cottage stormed to victory in 100th running of the Grand National horse race.

1974: West Indies legends Sir Garfield Sobers and Rohan Kanhai play their last day of Test cricket.

1987: Ice hockey icon Wayne Gretzky wins seventh-straight NHL scoring title with the Edmonton Oilers.