Like so many of the 3-pointers he’s taken, Luke Kennard is in.
The Ohio native was selected as one of eight players who will compete in the NBA’s 3-point contest during All-Star Weekend festivities on Feb. 19 in Cleveland, the league said Tuesday.
Going into Tuesday night’s game in Memphis, Kennard was shooting 42.8% from 3-point range this season, going 122 for 285 so far – both of those running totals already career-highs for a season.
His opponents for the two-round, timed shooting competition haven’t been quite as hot this season: Minnesota’s Karl-Anthony Towns (40.6% from behind the arc), Memphis’ Desmond Bane (41.4%), Chicago’s Zach LaVine (40.1%), CJ McCollum (38.4%) (who reportedly is being traded from Portland to New Orleans), Brooklyn’s Patty Mills (42.5%), Toronto’s Fred VanVleet (39.6%) and Atlanta’s Trae Young (37.2%).
All of them are first-time participants.
Last month, Clippers coach Tyronn Lue predicted that Kennard would “do great” if given the opportunity to compete in the event during All-Star Saturday Night, which also will include the Slam Dunk and Skills Challenge at Rocket Mortgage FieldHouse in Cleveland, about 3½ hours from Franklin, where Kennard grew up.
At Franklin High School – where they just retired Kennard’s No. 10 jersey – he twice was an Ohio Mr. Basketball winner as well as the Parade National Player of the Year as a senior, when he shot 49% from the 3-point line (100 for 204) and earned an invitation to compete in the 3-point shootout ahead of the McDonald’s All American Boys Basketball Game.
Kennard won that one, beating a field of finalists that included Dallas Mavericks guard Jalen Brunson and former Chicago Bulls guard Antonio Blakeney.
Luke’s won a 3-point contest (and probably more than one) before:https://t.co/KyuOMzqr3t
— Mirjam Swanson (@MirjamSwanson) February 9, 2022
The prospect of participating in the NBA’s 3-point contest definitely appealed to Kennard, he said recently.
“That’d be really cool,” he said. “Especially being back in Ohio, it’d be a pretty cool thing to do. Back home, friends and family, I know a lot would go.”
And Lue said he thought an appearance would further bolster the Clippers’ sharpshooter’s confidence:
“To win a 3-point shooting contest would give him a lot more confidence coming back to the team,” Lue said of Kennard, who currently is the second-best 3-point shooter in franchise history – his 43.6% during his season-plus with the team is better than every Clippers’ but JJ Redick, who finished shooting 44% from deep in his four seasons in L.A.
Redick was in the 3-point competition twice as a Clipper, in 2015 and ’16. Other Clippers who have taken a shot at the 3-point crown: Tobias Harris in 2018, Norm Nixon in 1986 and Quentin Richardson in 2002.
Now that he’s in, Kennard has an opportunity to do something none of the Clippers before him have: Win.
Also Tuesday, in light of the NBA’s 75th anniversary, the league also announced its Top 15 coaches, a list that included former Clippers coaches Doc Rivers (2013-19) and Larry Brown (1991-93), as well as Jack Ramsay, who led the Buffalo Braves from 1972-76.
Luke’s won a 3-point contest (and probably more than one) before:https://t.co/KyuOMzqr3t
— Mirjam Swanson (@MirjamSwanson) February 9, 2022
SCRUBB UPDATE
Tis the season for eyeball emojis on social media – reflecting all the rumors swirling before the NBA’s trade deadline (Thursday, noon PT) – and so Jay Scrubb sent Clippers Twitter atwitter on Monday night when, on Instagram, he pinned his location as being in Brooklyn, New York, without further explanation.
Was he back East looking for a slice of New York-style pizza or was he hinting that the Clippers could be cooking up a deal with the Nets?
On Tuesday morning, the Athletic’s Law Murray reported – via Tweet – that Scrubb was in Brooklyn getting a second opinion on the toe injury (characterized by the team as a right great toe sprain) that kept the second-year two-way guard unavailable to compete for the fourth consecutive game.
Closer to tipoff in Memphis, Lue declined to confirm or elaborate, except to say that he’d had contact with Scrubb just 15 minutes earlier and that the “he’s feeling pretty good, far as spirits-wise, and that’s all I can say.”
Jay Scrubb IG post Woj bomb incoming pic.twitter.com/wukY2NDg63
— 𝚋𝚛𝚊𝚗𝚍𝚘𝚗 (@TomlinWRLD) February 8, 2022
Jay Scrubb (turf toe) is in Brooklyn getting a second opinion according to Tyronn Lue.
— Law Murray (@LawMurrayTheNU) February 8, 2022