Marcus Smart said on Apr. 26 that the Los Angeles Lakers must stay focused as they prepare for Game 4 against the Houston Rockets, following a dramatic win that gave them a 3-0 lead in their playoff series.
The message from Smart comes after his late-game performance helped secure a narrow victory for the Lakers. He emphasized that despite being up in the series, there is still work to do. “We’ve got one more,” Smart said when asked about his message to teammates after going up 3-0. “It’s not over. We’ve got one more. We’re in their home and nobody wants to get embarrassed in their home. We got them in a nail-biter tonight, so it’s one more.
“We can’t worry about what happens after that because we gotta take care of that. We’ll worry about that after the game. Right now, Sunday is the only thing on our mind.”
Smart acknowledged that closing out a playoff series can be difficult, especially when playing away from home where opponents are fighting to avoid elimination. He described what mindset he believes is necessary: “For us, we’re just trying to have that killer mentality right now,” he continued. “We got them on the ropes and it’s our job to try to finish and their job to fight back. That’s been JJ’s motto all year, bend don’t break. I think we really took that to head for us, we lived it, instilled it in us, and you see that the way we played these three games.
“But we gotta be like a lion. We gotta have that killer instinct. We got them on the ground, we just gotta finish them off and keep our foot on their neck.”
The contributions of role players have been crucial alongside LeBron James during this playoff run according to Smart’s comments about team effort and experience.
Head coach JJ Redick also spoke about how an important conversation with Smart helped refocus the team before playoffs began following injuries late in the regular season.
Looking ahead, both players and coaches are stressing focus as they aim for another win on Sunday.