PHOENIX — Lakers star Anthony Davis was honored on Monday for his strong start to the season.
Davis was named the NBA’s Western Conference Player of the Week for the first week of the season (Oct. 22-Sunday) — the sixth Player of the Week honor he has received as a Laker and the 11th of his career.
He was last named Player of the Week for Week 22 of the 2023-24 season (March 18-24, 2024).
The All-Star big man averaged a league-best 34 points on 57.1% shooting from the field to go with 11 rebounds, 3.3 assists, 2.3 blocked shots and 1.7 steals while the Lakers started 3-0 with home wins against Minnesota, Phoenix and Sacramento.
Davis has become the Lakers’ offensive focal point under first-year head coach JJ Redick.
“We talk as a team a lot about choices and so, for me, that was a choice that was made on Day 1 and then you just kind of, that choice has been made,” Redick responded when asked ahead of Monday night’s game in Phoenix how high of a priority making Davis the offensive hub was.
Redick added: “There’s nothing else that you need to do. Now you go to the next priority. Obviously, I think even in preseason and through the first three regular-season games, that choice has been evident and our guys down the line have embraced that choice.”
With his 31-point performance in Saturday’s victory over Sacramento, Davis became the fourth Laker to start a season with three consecutive 30-point performances (36, 35, 31), joining Elgin Baylor (1961-62; 1962-63), Jerry West (1961-62; 1969-70) and Kobe Bryant (2005-06).
Baylor, West and Bryant opened the aforementioned seasons with four 30-point performances, meaning Davis entered Monday one 30-point performance from tying the record and two from breaking it.
Boston Celtics wing Jayson Tatum was named the Eastern Conference Player of the Week.
Lakers star LeBron James was a nominee for West Player of the Week.
Small samples
At this point of the season, most questions or observations are made with the caveat that everything is a “small sample” so far.
That phrase was used twice by Redick and a few times by reporters during Redick’s pregame media session on Monday.
But when does the sample — especially statistical — become large enough to make meaningful judgments?
“I looked at the season in quarters,” Redick said. “You have to assess every 20 games or so. The other thing with that is, people always talk about, ‘Oh, the playoffs are all about matchups.’ So is the regular season.
“Within a 20-25 game sample size, you can sort of deduct or get to some conclusions about your group and players because you’ve seen enough opponents now — a variety of play styles, a variety of personnel — that you can start to feel comfortable about who you are.”
Redick added: “Having said that, I feel really comfortable about who we are after three games. And it’s not just because of the results. There’s been a number of things in the first three games that I’m very encouraged by.”
Mike Budenholzer, the Suns’ new head coach who previously coached the Atlanta Hawks (2013-18) and Milwaukee Bucks (2018-23), offered his insight as well.
“It’s not easy to know exactly when,” Budenholzer said. “But I think we want to be checking in fairly often and fairly early. Especially given it’s our first year together. There’s things that have been emphasized throughout camp. And so while knowing that the sample size is small, I still think that the early check-in on some of the things that we’re talking about is going to be important.
“And there’s usually some kind of break in the schedule. There’s some kind of rhythm to the schedule. It could be game seven, it could be game 12, could be game eight, different things like that. But there’ll be a point where we need to have an early check-in, then you need to have another follow-up. And kind of throughout the season, there’s just important for us to stay on top of the things that we think are important.”