Audio By Carbonatix
There’s an NBA Rookie of the Year candidate on the Los Angeles Lakers, and he’s not LeBron’s kid.
Colorado’s Dalton Knecht, who graduated from Prairie View High School in Brighton, has exploded over the Lakers’ last three games after getting a spot in the starting lineup due to an injury to Rui Hachimura. The Thornton-raised rookie is showing that the bright lights of L.A. suit him and his jump-shooting range well.
In the Lakers’ loss to the Orlando Magic last night (which featured the University of Colorado’s Tristan da Silva as a starter along with Knecht), Knecht scored 17 points on an efficient 7 for 14 from the floor. That performance followed Knecht’s NBA-record-tying performance against the Utah Jazz earlier in the week in which he hit nine threes, good for the most in a game by any NBA rookie. Those nine threes also placed Knecht right behind Kobe Bryant for most threes in a game in Lakers history.
Knecht ended Tuesday night with 37 points against the Jazz. Over his last five games, he is averaging 22.8 points and shooting over 63 percent from beyond the arc.
James and Anthony Davis heaped praise on the Colorado product, with James saying he thought the sixteen teams who picked before the Lakers and didn’t draft Knecht “fucked it up.”
James said aside from his own son, who is also a rookie with the Lakers this year, Knecht was his favorite player in college.
“Everybody on the internet calls me a liar all the time,” LeBron said. “What am I now? I’ve been said it: I watched him. I watched Tennessee a lot. I did not think he was going to fall to us. I thought it’d be impossible. I have no idea how that happened, but (I’m) very grateful and very happy that he is here.”
Knecht graduated from the University of Tennessee as a fifth-year senior after becoming the SEC Player of the Year. But before he starred in a major conference, Knecht played at two Colorado universities.
After high school, Knecht had two growth spurts that helped him become an NBA prospect. Between his senior year of high school and freshman year at Northeastern Junior College in Sterling, Colorado, Knecht finally cracked six feet. While playing there for two years, he grew to 6′ 6″ before transferring to Northern Colorado to play for another two years. At UNC he averaged over 20 points and 7 rebounds per game.
Those numbers earned Knecht a transfer spot at Tennessee for his extra year of eligibility granted because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Knecht took the opportunity at Tennessee and ran with it, posting an average of 21.7 points per game and impressing scouts in the NCAA Tournament.
Once again, Knecht has made the most of a big chance to succeed. With the Lakers, he’s worked his way up from playing limited minutes to the starting lineup. In L.A.’s most recent game, on November 21, he played the most minutes of any Lakers player.
Knecht’s three-point shooting ability fits well on a Lakers team where James and Davis pull defenders into the paint. Knecht will face his home state on Saturday, November 23, when the Denver Nuggets head to L.A. to play the Lakers.
With the loss of Kentavious Caldwell-Pope in the off-season, plus star Nikola Jokic’s lengthening absence for personal reasons, Denver could really use a guy like Knecht right about now.
