Lakers coach JJ Redick was already drawing up plays for Dalton Knecht on draft night
There was no better movement shooter in the NBA Draft than Dalton Knecht. That was the category that ESPN ranked the former Tennessee Basketball star wing No. 1 in leading into the draft on Wednesday.
“Tennessee gave Knecht all the work he could handle as a scorer this season,” ESPN’s Jeremey Woo wrote, “and he proved quite dangerous working away from the ball, making 39.7% of his total shots off screens and 36.8% of 3s. He has developed a good understanding of how to set defenders up and can knock down jumpers cleanly on the move or off one dribble.”
ESPN was all in on Knecht’s NBA potential, ranking him No. 8 on the list of the top 100 players available for the draft and putting him at No. 6 to the Charlotte Hornets in the final mock draft on Wednesday.
Lakers scouts had Dalton Knecht as ‘a top-10 player unanimously’
But on draft night, Knecht started sliding. First it was out of the top 10, then out of the lottery, then all the way down to the Lakers at No. 17 overall.
“We would have never imagined a player as skilled and sort of perfect for our needs would be there for us, as Dalton Knecht (was),” Rob Pelinka, LA’s director of basketball operations and general manager, said Wednesday night after the draft.
“We had him as a top-10 player unanimously across our scout boards … just couldn’t be happier.”
The fall in the draft led to what appears to be a perfect marriage, though.
The Lakers hired JJ Redick as their new head coach on June 20. He was one of the best movement shooters in the history of college basketball at Duke, then played 15 years in the NBA, shooting 41.5% from the 3-point line while making 1,950 threes in 940 career games.
Who better to coach Knecht than Redick?
“I was joking with Coach Redick upstairs,” Pelinka said on Wednesday, “that we found a movement shooter to match his skills as a player. And he already had his whiteboard out, drawing up pin-downs and ATOs and actions where he could run a movement shooter off screens. So I think his mind is already working on drawing up plays for Dalton.”
Rick Barnes on Dalton Knecht to the Lakers: ‘I think it’s a great scenario for Dalton’
Knecht spent his season at Tennessee getting more familiar with Redick, too. Rick Barnes used actions from Redick’s Duke career with the Vols last season and spent time watching film of Redick with Knecht, showing him the different ways he could get himself open.
“Just the way (Redick) moves and paces himself,” Knecht said on Wednesday, “and was able to create space. So hearing that, it’s going to be really exciting and really special.”
“One thing JJ said,” Barnes said on Friday, “he said that he wanted to really put a big emphasis on player development, which Dalton’s going to be a great guy to have a chance to work under that.
“And so I think all said and done, I think it’s a great scenario for Dalton and he’s excited about it and has a chance to go to one of the greatest franchise in sports history and play certainly with some of the very best players and one the best of all time. So he’s excited and we’re excited for him.”
