Spencer Dinwiddie Is the Latest Key to a Postseason Run For the Lakers

When Spencer Dinwiddie scores his jersey number the Lakers are tough to beat.

The Los Angeles Lakers beat the Indiana Pacers, 150-145, in a thriller Sunday night. It was the Lakers' third straight win and the second time in those three games that they scored more than 135 points. In fact, Sunday's today was the most points scored by a Lakers team since January 1987. Four Lakers players tallied 25-plus points, which was the first time an NBA team has accomplished the feat in more than three years.

The most notable part of the night was that Spencer Dinwiddie (together with Anthony Davis, LeBron James and Austin Reaves) was one of the players who turned in a big performance. Dinwiddie finished with 26 points on 11 shots in 35 minutes. The Lakers added Dinwiddie off the buyout market in February and the marriage has been underwhelming so far. It should go without saying that if this is the version of the 30-year-old guard that shows up the rest of the season, the Lakers could be dangerous. That doesn't seem likely considering he had only scored 26 total points over his previous six games with Los Angeles. It was only his seventh 20-point game this season and he hadn't scored 26 or more since November when still with the Brooklyn Nets.

So was this game a fluke against a Pacers team that is allowing 121 points a game this season, or can Dinwiddie really go back to being the guy who once averaged 20.6 points per game for the Nets during the 2019-2020 season? The answer may be somewhere in between. If Dinwiddie can put this kind of performance together sometimes, with D'Angelo Russell -- who has averaged 20.0 points per game in March -- doing it on other nights, Los Angeles may have something to work with.

The Lakers appear headed for the play-in tournament again and the key, as always, is to find a few contributors who play well alongside James and Davis. They were able to follow that simple formula all the way to the Western Conference Finals in 2023. They have now given fans and media members just enough of a taste to believe they can do it again.

Stephen Douglas is a staff writer at The Big Lead.