Bench scoring has not been an area of strength for the Los Angeles Lakers, but they opted to bring in Luke Kennard at the trade deadline to help aid in that.
Having a player or two that can score when either Luka Doncic, LeBron James or Austin Reaves rests is a massive help. In Kennard’s Laker debut, he instantly drained his first 3-pointer and it was not an easy attempt.
While he is known for his shooting, Kennard had instances of attacking close outs and making right reads on weakside cuts for layups. Head coach JJ Redick took notice of that and applauded his newest guard for having the ability to make the right play.
“I just thought the guys played really good basketball and you could see with Luke in particular, just his ability to just make reads and make plays,” Redick said after the Lakers win over the Golden State Warriors. “He’s not a guy you’re going to like give the ball to in [isolation] and then he is going to, bend the defense but he’s a smart basketball player and he knows how to play, and he knows how to make reads. The way his 0.5 mentality works is, he doesn’t always get the assist, but generally speaking, he’s going to attack a closeout. He is gonna get a shot fake and then swing the ball, and that leads to something good. So, I thought, he was, for his first time with us and getting here yesterday was really good.”
In limited time together, Redick tried to keep things simple for Kennard and ended up drawing an ATO for him, which resulted in a wide-open 3-pointer that he drained.
“That’s a draw-up,” he said. “That’s an ATO; that’s not a set. We tried to, with him, the way that today worked. There was a lot of just ‘Laker Nail’ to be honest with you, especially in the second half. Some of that was who we wanted to attack, and some of that was just trying to get something out of the offense versus trying to run anything too fancy. We didn’t get a ton out of the post in the first half. We kind of went away from that in the second half. We got a little bit out of it, but really it was just, trying to attack the paint and I thought [LeBron James] started off the second half kind of leading on that, just set the tone with just getting in the paint and trying to score there.”
As time passes, it will be interesting to monitor how Redick continues to integrate Kennard into their offense and add to it as an elite movement shooter.
Luke Kennard broke LeBron James’ Ohio high school scoring record
Something most people do not know is Luke Kennard broke LeBron James’ Ohio high school scoring record and it is a stat he can hold over his new teammate.
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