Andrew Nembhard 'special' on both ends with game-winning 3 and D on LeBron
LOS ANGELES -- Tyrese Haliburton told Andrew Nembhard he needed to get a picture of his buzzer-beating 3-pointer on his social media accounts as soon as humanly possible. Before he left the locker room. Before he texted back anyone who was blowing up his phone. Before he even called his mother.
Just get that picture up right now, Haliburton told the rookie point guard, and caption it "Game."
Because the shot Nembhard hit to beat the Lakers 116-115 on Monday night at Crypto.com Arena had several layers that made it even more awesome than your average buzzer-beater. It came at the end of a wild scramble in which the Pacers had to track down an offensive rebound to keep the play going. It completed a 17-point fourth-quarter comeback, giving the surprising Pacers their 12th win in 20 games and their eighth win this young season in a game in which they trailed by at least 10 points. It also happened on a night when Nembhard returned after missing a week's worth of games with a left knee bruise.
Oh, and Nembhard also drilled it with LeBron James' hand in his face.
It was a statement shot for the Pacers, further proof in case any was still needed that they have no intentions of backing down to anyone, not even a team with three of the top 75 players in NBA history on its roster. It improved their record to 12-8 and kept a team picked to finish at the bottom of the NBA in fourth in the Eastern Conference. But it was also a moment that captured Nembhard's unflappable essence.
The ball found Nembhard's hands with .8 seconds remaining on the clock and arguably the best player in the known universe charging at him. But he didn't rush anything. He just caught Haliburton's pass, let it go with a little more arc to escape the 6-9, 250-pound James' outstretched arms and swished it.
"In those moments, it seems like everything goes in slow-motion somewhat," Pacers coach Rick Carlisle said. "... To be able to hang in, keep your sights on the rim, let it go over a 6-9 all-time-great player is special. It's special."
All season, Carlisle has been trying to tell anyone who will listen that "special" is exactly what Nembhard is. He will never be considered the most talented rookie in the Pacers' 2022 draft class with No. 6 overall pick Bennedict Mathurin putting up scoring figures rarely seen from a first-year player, ranking second on the team with 19.1 points per game. Nembhard is averaging a more modest 7.1 per game to go with 2.9 assists, but he's unquestionably become one of the most important players on the Pacers' roster because of what he can do on both ends of the floor. Monday night's win encapsulated his value.
Nembhard didn't even find out he'd be playing until Sunday. He bruised his left knee in a win at Houston over the Rockets on Nov. 18, tried to play at home the next night against the Orlando Magic and found that wasn't the best idea. The Pacers gave him a week to recover, they still listed him as questionable on the injury report on Monday, and Carlisle did not insert him back in the starting role he held when he left. He didn't enter the game until the last 2:43 of the first quarter.
But his assignment was the exact opposite of easing back into play. Once James got back on the floor, it was Nembhard's job to defend him, because Carlisle has already found that the 6-3, 191-pound Nembhard is one of his best defensive options against the league's best wing players, even foes much bigger than him. He got time against Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving in the Pacers' first two games in Brooklyn, and in his first start of the season on Nov. 7, he practically took New Orleans Pelicans guard C.J. McCollum out of the game.
"He's been a solid player at both ends all year for us," Carlisle said. "He's one of our better defenders. Nobody's going to stop LeBron James, but Andrew just has a good feel for making it difficult on good players. He's guarded some great players like LeBron. He's guarded a couple of the Brooklyn guys. You guard superstar players as a rookie and you have to have some real moxie to be able to do it and not just get called for foul after foul. He's shown some real veteran wherewithal, wisdom beyond his years. He's unafraid, man."
Nembhard knew James would try to bully him, and he did. James tried over and over again to post Nembhard up and back him down, but even giving up close to 60 pounds, Nembhard hit back and provided steady resistance and James either passed the ball away or tried to spin back and shoot over top of him and it rarely worked. And he did it without putting James on the free throw line.
"I just wanted to be physical with him throughout the game," Nembhard said. "Just make his looks tough. I know he's a great player, great passer. I just wanted to try to make him take some fadeaways. I just tried to play hard really."
And James indeed had to work for his buckets. Before Nembhard entered the game in the first quarter, James scored 10 points on 3 of 5 shooting a pair of 3-pointers. The rest of the game, he was 5 of 17 from the field and 1 of 7 from beyond the 3-point arc and he didn't take a single free throw after the first quarter. He scored a total of 11 points in the final three quarters to finish with 21 for the game. Nembhard didn't guard James for all of those minutes, but he was the most effective primary defender the Pacers used.
"He can guard, man," Haliburton said. "There's no ifs, ands or buts about it. He can guard multiple positions. He's just special."
What he did on the offensive end, even before the game-winning shot, was special too in its own way.
Nembhard is a point guard by trade, but he's proven in the past he's willing to accept a less ball-dominant role to help his teams win. He did it at Gonzaga in 2020-21 when he came off the bench for half the season allowing Jalen Suggs to run the show, but winning the West Coast Conference's Sixth Man of the Year honors.
With the Pacers, Haliburton is always the primary ball-handler when he's on the floor. Nembhard shares point guard duties with T.J. McConnell when Haliburton's off, but he's also had to play with the ball out of his hands more. That's given him catch-and-shoot opportunities, and with them, he's been a more efficient shooter than he ever was in college. In four years split between Florida and Gonzaga, he shot 34.3% from beyond the arc, hitting on 150 of 437 career attempts. With the Pacers, he's hit on 21 of 49 attempts so far, 42.9%.
Nembhard didn't attempt a single shot in the first half, but he hit on two of his three attempts in the third quarter. Then in the fourth, Haliburton found him on the break for a pull-up 3-pointer with 2:11 to go that brought the Pacers back within one point after they'd trailed by 17 earlier in the quarter and by nine less than a minute earlier.
So when the ball found him in the game's final second after a missed 3-pointer by center Myles Turner and and offensive rebound by Haliburton, he already had plenty of shooting rhythm and confidence to take and make that shot. He sank it to finish with 12 points on 4 of 8 shooting and to finish off the Lakers.
"You stay calm when you work in the gym for those types of moments, I think," Nembhard said. "You just have to bring your confidence and when it comes, you just have to step up for the team. It was a great team win, we had a lot of contributions from a lot of guys, and it was just my turn to step up in that moment."
Nembhard left his arm up in the air after he let it go, but still seemed a little stunned when it fell. He crouched down at the knees, ran toward halfcourt with three fingers raised, then was mobbed from two directions at halfcourt by teammates coming from the floor and the bench.
"I have so much love and respect for the kid," said McConnell, a 30-year-old veteran sounding in awe of the rookie eight years his junior. "He's just an incredible person, an incredible teammate, an incredible professional. The consummate pro. He's missed how many games and comes back and doesn't miss a beat and hits a shot like that. He's unreal, just so poised and never afraid of the moment. It's rare to find someone who can really play at a high level at both ends. He does it at a high level at both ends. We put him on the best of the best in this league and he answers the bell and he hits big shots for us."
Joining the mob surrounding Nembhard was Pacers president of basketball operations Kevin Pritchard, who Carlisle joked looked like Jim Valvano looking for anyone to hug after North Carolina State won the 1983 NCAA title. Pritchard never quite got to Nembhard, settling to hug McConnell but it was fitting he was out there, Carlisle said, because it was Pritchard who pushed hard for Nembhard in the draft process. The Pacers took him with the first pick of the second round and the 31st overall though some mock drafts had him going several picks later, and they signed him for four years and $8.6 million with three years and $6.4 million of that guaranteed.
It was the most ever for a second-round pick coming out of college and it was more than many late first-rounders but Carlisle sees it as a bargain now.
"Kevin and his staff really nailed it on him," Carlisle said. "Because he'll go down as a top 12 or 15 pick in this draft when it's all said and done. That's where he should have been taken."
Instead the Pacers were blessed with two rookies in the same class who already play like veterans, and they've put the whole franchise ahead of schedule.
This article originally appeared on Indianapolis Star: Pacers vs. Lakers: Nembhard's game-winning 3 part of special night
