The Los Angeles Lakers are playing some of the best basketball of the season, winning six of their last eight games and currently finding themselves in the Play-In Tournament. Obviously Anthony Davis and his unbelievable play has been the catalyst, but the Lakers have gotten excellent contributions from their role players as well and chief among them has been Troy Brown Jr.
The Lakers’ wing has been outstanding as of late and solidified why he is an important part of the rotation. Brown has hit multiple 3-pointers in each of the last four games, scoring in double-figures in three of those and is averaging 13.5 points on 56.5% shooting from 3-point range over that same stretch.
As for what has helped get him going in these last few games, Brown pointed to his Lakers teammates. “Honestly, I give that to my teammates. They’ve been passing me the ball on time and on target and for me, I feel like that’s why they brought me here – to spread the floor and give them a dynamic player that does a lot. So being able to knock down 3s and take pressure off of them and space the floor so they can get to the basket really helps.”
Brown has undoubtedly been a critical part of the Lakers’ success recently and his ability to stretch the floor while also providing good perimeter defense is exactly what the team needs. Against Memphis, Brown provided arguably the highlight of the night with his dunk over John Konchar, a moment he could barely recall after the fact.
“Honestly, it all happened so fast that I don’t even remember,” Brown said. “I was surprised he jumped, I thought I was in front of him. It was a pretty nice play though. I had no idea [that the dunk went in]. I heard everybody yelling, it started getting crazy up in there.”
Thanks to their win over Memphis, the Lakers now sit in the Play-In, though they have their sights set higher. Obviously the team has to remain focused on their own games, but Brown admitted that he will keep an eye on the standings as well.
“I’m for sure gonna look tomorrow,” the Lakers wing noted. “I’ll definitely lock in and see who’s playing tomorrow, we definitely got some teams that we hope lose and stuff like that. We’re trying to get as high as we can in the standings, especially just because Play-In wise, I don’t think anybody really wants to do the Play-In Game. So if we could definitely steal a spot and get in there, that would be great.”
If the team can continue performing at this level, the Lakers could very well find themselves in an even better playoff position when the regular season comes to an end.
Austin Reaves doesn’t believe Troy Brown Jr. gets the credit he deserves
Brown’s performance has certainly not gone unnoticed by his teammates and guard Austin Reaves made sure to shout out his teammate and give him the credit he believes Brown deserves.
“I don’t think he gets the credit that he deserves, honestly,” Reaves said. “You know, because you look at stats and the stats don’t jump out at you. … Always usually chasing around the team’s best player. Rebounds the ball well, and then the confidence shooting the ball. He’s a very, very capable shooter and shoots it well. We’ve seen that since the summer when we were playing pickup.
“So it’s not new for any of us. We want him to shoot it with as much confidence as he can, because we know he can make it. But like I said, I don’t think he gets the credit that he deserves.”
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