Lakers rookie Dalton Knechtstill sweating off the career-high 27 points that helped bury the Pelicans on saturday night, wanted a minute. His Tennessee Volunteers were driving against Georgia, and as he stared at his phone, he called for one more play before he began his postgame interview.
Tennessee committed a penalty and was forced to punt, opportunity wasted.
Despite being an All-American in college a year ago, Knecht couldn’t relate. Because when he has opportunities, like the one before him with the Lakershe does not move backwards.
After Knecht hung up his phone, he talked about the confidence the Lakers have in him, about how, after editing him 17ththey authorized him to let it fly, with coach JJ Redick drawing up specific plays for Knecht to shoot.
“It’s always good to have a coach like that, that’s very confident in you, always wanting you to shoot the ball,” Knecht said. “So when I go out there and I shoot some crazy shots or something I shouldn’t. be shooting, it’s always good to have JJ have my back.”
Despite the greenest possible light, at least one of his 93 NBA field goal attempts had to cross Knecht’s “crazy or something” threshold, right?
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“No, not at all,” he said with a laugh. “I think every time I shoot the ball, I think it’s a great shot.”
It’s exactly the mindset the Lakers were hoping for.
In Redick’s first official act as Lakers head coach, the team prepared for the NBA draft, a group of players including Tristan Da Silva and Yves Missi the likely targets for the Lakers, according to people with knowledge of the plans.
However, Knecht, projected by some to be taken inside the top five, found himself in a draft-night freefall. Concerns about his age (he’s 23) and his ability to execute NBA defensive concepts pushed him down the board and, suddenly, right into the Lakers’ laps.
One year after passing on the big skater of the draft, Cam Whitmore, and on an established veteran like Jaime Jaquez Jr., the Lakers did not make the same mistake twice – grabbing the scorer even if the Lakers did not do any extensive homework. on him as a prospect.
Whether it was at Northeastern Junior College, Northern Colorado or Tennessee, Knecht could win.
The fit was ideal for both. The Lakers, desperate to add shooting for what appears to be the 100th straight offseason, have landed one of the best available in college basketball. And Knecht landed in a situation where there would be an early opportunity to play for Redick, a player Knecht’s college coach, Rick Barnes, tried to model his game after.
“We didn’t think Dalton was going to be available at 17,” Redick said after the Lakers selected Knecht. “But he provides something that we just don’t have. He’s a shifty shooter, he can obviously play off the bounce. We looked at him very high on our draft board, and he can score at all three levels. He has size, there were a lot of things to be excited about with Dalton. And I’m excited to coach him.”
The excitement didn’t fade when the two began working together, Redick quickly anointing Knecht as an elite shooter, even to NBA Hall of Famer Reggie Miller before Knecht scored 25 fourth-quarter points and overtime in a preseason win against Phoenix.
He finished with 35 points. The last Lakers rookie with that many points in the preseason was Kobe Bryant.
“The thing about him is just the mindset,” Redick said. “It was very evident in pickup before the season. In training camp, so far in games, he has no fear. He is not afraid of the moment. That was a show he put on.”
And then, the show stopped.
The game in Phoenix gave Lakers fans a taste of what Knecht could do, a shooter and scorer who, at any moment, could burn the nets with a flurry of buckets. Preseason or not, people were excited.
Snoop Dogg nicknamed him “Westside Knecht” on ESPN the day after the preseason blowout against the Suns.
However, newcomers rarely escape adversity, and Knecht was no exception. Despite starting the season in Redick’s rotation, he was mostly on the fringes of their early wins, and by the time the Lakers hit the road for the first time, Knecht was almost in a full-blown slump.
He scored 18 in a blowout loss to Cleveland, but most of that came with the game already over. He made just four of 18 shots from three-point range over the next five games.
“I don’t let myself think he’s a top-tier, top-percentage shooter,” Redick said after the Cleveland game. “I see it almost every day.”
Lakers fans didn’t have to wait long to see it for themselves.
Knecht’s shooting turned a game around after the third quarter against the Grizzlies on Wednesday, when he made all five of his threes en route to 19 points.
Then, with Rui Hachimura dealing with an ankle injury, Redick moved Knecht into the starting lineup and he scored 14 against the Spurs on Friday, setting the stage in New Orleans on Saturday when he finished with a career-high 27 points – three straight games. in which Knecht showed that the Lakers may have gotten a draft night bargain.
“It’s no surprise to me,” LeBron James said Saturday.
Redick said as Knecht’s role expanded, so did his rookie’s feel and timing.
“He’s getting comfortable,” Redick said. “But I would also say that when you’re an offensive player, when you’re a guy who’s an advanced shooter, getting longer runs and getting more minutes, you’re naturally just going to be more in the flow of the game. I think maybe I called a play or two, for him. But he just got it with our offense and our passing and ball movement. So it’s just, I think the flow of the game for him is there when he gets extended runs.”
Opposing teams targeted Knecht on the defensive end, and the results were about as expected. Redick said a few times, he held. Sometimes, he has not. Overall, though, Knecht played with the kind of competitiveness and toughness that can overcome some of the deficiencies on the defensive end.
And offense, the Lakers think they have themselves something special.
“He’s already ready. It’s kind of like [Damian Lillard] was You go through college so long, you mature, you get older,” Anthony Davis said in New Orleans. “He doesn’t need the confidence. But when you have guys telling you to shoot the ball, that usually shows that we have the utmost confidence in you to go out there and make shots. He makes big shots, he makes big shots.
“And, like I said, it gives us a boost, especially when two or three come in. We are looking for him. We look for him to shoot the basketball and it just opens up everything else for us.”
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Over the last three games, Knecht has emerged as an X-factor for the Lakers, the kind of rookie weapon teams typically don’t draft midway through the first round.
After Knecht’s preseason performance in Phoenix, Redick was asked about making sure Knecht doesn’t get too far ahead of himself.
“Dalton is easy,” Redick said. “He’s not going to get too high or get too low. He, in the best possible way, has like a short-term memory with things. He’s just on to the next thing. It is represented in his background and the way he came up and his path and journey to reach the stage. He’s just on to the next thing. He has a growth mindset.”
Thirteen games into his NBA career, Knecht has shown that — and it’s time to show a lot more.
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This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
