LOS ANGELES_Toward the end of last season, Josh Hart enjoyed the way the narrative about the Los Angeles Lakers' young core had changed.
When his rookie season started, no one talked about him as part of it. When it ended, they did.
Hart, a 6-foot-5 guard, took that into the offseason and returned for his second year as a Laker picking up right where he left off. On Thursday night, in a 128-123 win over the Sacramento Kings, Lakers Coach Luke Walton gave Hart his second start of the preseason at shooting guard. Hart is competing with Kentavious Caldwell-Pope to be the Lakers' starting shooting guard.
"With Josh last year every time he switched onto a big (man) we were good," Lakers Coach Luke Walton said. "We kept our tight shell and we played good defense. We weren't just sending a double-team man over right away to try to take away that mismatch."
Thursday's game was the Lakers' first win of the preseason and they won it in dramatic fashion. With the Lakers up by one with 38 seconds left in the game, Brandon Ingram stole the inbounds pass from Sacramento's Cameron Reynolds and denied the Kings a scoring chance.
Later, Ingram missed two free throws with the Lakers leading, 124-123, but Kyle Kuzma tipped in his second miss to give the Lakers a three-point lead with 9.1 seconds left.
LeBron James played 15:38, scoring 18 points. James did not play in the second half, like he has throughout the preseason. Late in the second quarter, James was fouled as he sank a floater that tied the game at 56. The ensuing free throw gave the Lakers the lead.
Ingram led the Lakers with 31 points and Kuzma scored 17.
Hart added 17 points, but his impact is often its greatest defensively. On a team that likes to switch assignments defensively, Hart's ability to guard big men is unparalleled among the other Lakers guards. His teammates have noticed.
"He's about to take my job," Lakers center JaVale McGee quipped. "Dang. Let me do me, man. Keep shooting 3s."
Hart can do it in part because he loves it.
"He loves the challenge," Walton said. "He gets mad if you send a double team when he's guarding the post. For him. the adjustment would come more offensively playing some of those types of spots than defensively."
