Lakers News: Darvin Ham Reveals Whether Or Not Matt Ryan Buzzer Beater Was Planned

It was one of the better shots and plays the Lakers have had in a long time.

In the least dramatic way possible, reserve Los Angeles Lakers small forward Matt Ryan may have saved the Lakers' 2022-23 season on Wednesday night. 

Okay, maybe not really. But the shot he hit in the corner to force overtime and an eventual win against the visiting New Orleans Pelicans was one of the bigger regular season shots a Laker has hit in recent memory. Especially to salvage a game in which the Lakers led by as many as 16 points once, but were trailing the Pelicans by three at the time of the shot, with 1.3 seconds remaining in the fourth quarter.

Matty Ice calls OT ❄️ pic.twitter.com/bIn3f95mLM

— Los Angeles Lakers (@Lakers) November 3, 2022

Ryan isn't the only guy who deserves credit for that play, though. Los Angeles guard Austin Reaves deserves made an impressive cross court path off the inbound to even give Ryan a chance to hit that shot. And, how can you not give credit to Lakers head coach Darvin Ham for not only subbing Ryan on in that moment, but calling the play for him?

During a postgame conversation, Ham was asked point-blank whether or not that was the play he drew up.

"The play was definitely intended for [Matt Ryan], Austin [Reaves] threw a hell of a pass, and we were fortunate." - Darvin Ham talks about the Lakers fighting back to take the game to OT and winning it. pic.twitter.com/jZNB56rlQ1

— Spectrum SportsNet (@SpectrumSN) November 3, 2022

The Lakers may only sport a 2-5 record on the young season, but they've looked much better across their last two games, and got an even bigger jolt of momentum from Matt Ryan's big shot. 

L.A.'s next game is Friday at 7:30 pm against the Jazz, when the club will look to put together a three-game winning streak for the first time since they won four contests in a row between December 31st, 2021 and January 7th, 2022. Yes, it's really been that long.