Darvin Ham Explains Decision To Start Rui Hachimura Over Taurean Prince

Due to various injuries and overall inconsistency, Los Angeles Lakers head coach Darvin Ham has been forced to change his starting lineup a number of times so far this season.

Ahead of Saturday night’s big game against the New York Knicks, Ham made another significant change, replacing Taurean Prince with Rui Hachimura in the starting group. Prince had started every game he played with the Lakers leading up to that point.

After the game, Ham explained why he decided to make that change and discussed how well it worked as the Lakers picked up a big win in New York, via Spectrum SportsNet:

“Just coming out and being bigger on the frontline, creating some balance. Taurean, he has to do it on both sides of the ball and I just felt like him coming off the bench just would allow him to not only help us sure up our bench in terms of not only a defensive presence, but also allow him to get some buckets too. We need him to score and be aggressive offensively. So he was able to do that, he came in and had 16 points, so it worked out well. It created a nice sense of balance.”

Despite the lineup change, it was still Prince that closed the game and played 33 minutes compared to just 19 for Hachimura. As Ham stated, the move to the bench allowed Prince to be more aggressive offensively, scoring 16 points on 6-of-10 shooting. It also gave the starting group some more size with Hachimura on the wing alongside LeBron James and Anthony Davis.

That is the balance that Ham was hoping to create when he made the lineup change, and he’s hoping this is the change that will stick:

“I’m hoping. I’m hoping like crazy. I think we’ve had probably out of 15 different ones, there’s been three that’s been deliberate and not unforeseen circumstances. So yeah, that’s definitely the plan.”

The Lakers have already had 15 different starting lineups this season, so the hope is that everyone can remain healthy moving forward so they can stick with this group and build continuity in the second half.

Darvin Ham understands LeBron James’ call for urgency with the Lakers

Amid the Lakers’ recent struggles, LeBron James posted a cryptic hourglass tweet that had many people speculating on what he meant.

While he declined to elaborate, Darvin Ham took it as a call for urgency for the Lakers and he agrees with James’ sentiment considering the team is just one game above .500 at 26-25.