Pau Gasol Part of Rare Group Upon Dishing out 3,000th Assist

Chicago Bulls forward Pau Gasol recently recorded his 3,000th career assist during Saturday's 99-90 loss to the Indiana Pacers, making him just the sixth player ever to reach 16,000 points, 8,000 rebounds, 3,000 assists and 1,500 blocks, per the Bulls' official Twitter account.

Though mostly excellent in his first season with Chicago, Gasol finished Saturday's game with a modest stat line of 12 points, six rebounds, just the one assist and four blocks. He made just four of his 15 field-goal attempts, though he did hit all four of his free throws.

Prior to Saturday, the 34-year-old Gasol recorded at least 15 points and nine rebounds in each of his first nine games with the Bulls. Even after the down performance, he is averaging 18.6 points, 10.6 rebounds, 1.9 assists, 2.5 blocks and 0.4 steals over 34.8 minutes, with a .486 field-goal percentage and .784 free-throw percentage.

The Spanish forward is now part of an exclusive six-player club that also includes Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Hakeem Olajuwon, Kevin Garnett, Tim Duncan and Shaquille O'Neal, per K.C. Johnson of the Chicago Tribune.

Of course, there would likely be more than six qualifying players, if not for the fact that blocks weren't officially kept as an NBA statistic until the 1973-74 season.

All stats come from Basketball-Reference.com unless otherwise noted.