Memphis Grizzlies guard Ja Morant threw the best dunk of the NBA season against the Indiana Pacers on Saturday night. I ran to Smith and threw Monster Jam.
“Playing in this league for so long, you see special things in special players, and that was one of them,” Pacers point guard TJ McConnell said of the postgame play. .
The dunk came in the third quarter of last night’s fight. Morant had some highlights throughout the night, including a ridiculous block just minutes earlier. But this dunk was the most impressive play of them all.
Morant said it was his best dunk after the game because of how difficult it was. “Yeah, easy,” he said when asked if it was his best slam.
He didn’t know what to do at that moment. He saw the Grizzlies’ bench, yelled at them, and eventually backed off to play defense. He said Memphis head coach Taylor Jenkins later talked to him about some carry-ons about returning to defense.
Morant remembered what happened immediately after the dunk. He laughed and said his Ja 1s, his shoes, helped complete the play.
Smith has tried to play defensively, which is always noble, even if it puts him on the wrong end of the highlight. He did everything he could to stop the dunk. He has set career-highs for average blocks per game (0.9) and block percentage (4.0%) this season.
But Morant got him on this play. “I mean, without him, he probably would have dunked harder. Obviously, he’s their rim protector.” [He] We took our chances,” Morant said.
“He just dunked me. He’s a shot blocker, so he’ll get dunked from time to time. It’s not surprising,” Smith said of the play.
Smith had two blocks that night, including one in which Giaire Williams attempted a dunk within 100 seconds of Morant’s highlight. He kept trying to protect Limu all night long.
“He’s an athletic dunker. He’ll get caught once in a while,” Smith said of Morant.
You can hear Ja Morant talking about dunks below.
The Grizzlies beat the Pacers 130-112.
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