Nearly 42 minutes into Friday’s game against the Clippers, Marcus Smart hadn’t even taken a shot or scored a point. In true Smart fashion, he proceeded to hit back-to-back baskets and score all seven of his points in the final 6:32 of the game.
While Luka Dončić took a lot of the focus for his own late-game performance, both Smart and Deandre Ayton drew the praise from head coach JJ Redick for their contributions in the win.
“I thought Smart and [Ayton], in that fourth quarter, were really difference makers for us,” Redick said. “Smart was fantastic on defense all night and then, seven minutes left in the fourth or whatever it was and he hasn’t taken a shot and we come out of a timeout, he makes a three and then he makes another one and then he gets the and one…Just huge stuff from him, leadership in the huddles, all that.
“Then DA was great and very engaged and just was able to execute our defensive game plan at a really high level.”
Smart is not unfamiliar with big moments and big games and performed as such on Friday. After being a relative non-factor offensively for much of the game, Smart had some of the biggest shots of the night down the stretch.
“I thought Smart stayed ready,” LeBron James said. “I thought he was professional. Didn’t shoot the ball at all pretty much throughout the first three quarters and then in the fourth quarter hit big time shots.”
For Ayton, this comment is especially poignant as he has had struggles when he’s been healthy of late. He’s had a stretch of games in which he did not close fourth quarters with the team opting for either Jaxson Hayes or a smallball lineup.
Seeing him bounceback in the first game out of the All-Star break is encouraging. The best version of the Lakers involves Ayton at his best. While he wasn’t at his best necessarily on Friday, he was playing at a high level, hopefully the first of many such games to end the regular season.
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