The Dan Le Batard Show with Stugotz - Alley Oop 170: LUKE KENNARD WINS IT FOR THE LAKERS | March Madness Chaos, Luka Suspended & Curry Returns

Episode Date: March 24, 2026

LUKE KENNARD ACTIVATES SNIPER MODE Juju and Trysta kick things off with the INSANE buzzer-beater that saw Luke Kennard win it for the Lakers in dramatic fashion — one of the wildest finishes of the season.From there, the chaos continues as they dive into March Madness, including the Florida Gators making noise, St. John’s staying hot under their winning coach, and the Vanderbilt game that had everyone talking.The conversation heats up with Miami’s performance, plus major NBA storylines — including Luka’s shocking suspension, the return of Jalen Williams, and Steph Curry back in action.This episode is packed with clutch moments, controversy, and tournament madness you don’t want to miss. Tap in for all the takes, reactions, and debates. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Trista Crick, how you doing? How you feeling today? Well, Juju, I'm not going to lie, I'm playing hurt. Oh, no. Yeah, Juju, I'm just happy to be here. I'm happy to get your energy and soak it right up. Man, my energy is soakable. You feel me?

If you're out there listening to this, come on, man, get to some of this. There's some good energy I got today. You dig? It's also boyfriend material. I love you, baby, wherever you are. I see you. I got some Joker moments from the weekend. I feel like it's a lot of,

a lot of stuff being celebrated right now on ESPN, other networks, all the sports, Fox Sports, whatever. But I want to talk about some of the low lights, some of the questions I got from the weekend because you might call it's experts since. I don't know if you know that. And it's the flu game, too. I also don't know if you know what happened to MJ that time he had the flu and what performance he put up.

So I'm pretty sure you're going to be bobbing and weaving today. First up, the Florida Gators lose to the Iowa. What are they, the Hawkeyes? They're the Hawkeyes. Brough, down the stretch, play calling from the coaches to me was questionable. Why are you full court pressing you're up to? Why are you trailing the man, Boogie Flan? Yeah, you're up to.

And then the last play call, you're not even going to get a shot off. Sis, did you see that game? No, that part really pissed me off. I felt like if you're Florida, you have to figure out a way to get down the court. You saw that happen with Kentucky in the second game or the first game when they ended up getting down the court for almost a three. It was like still deep, almost half court,

but like they did that in 2.9 seconds. There was longer than 2.9 seconds, Juju, you have to be able to get a quality shot off at that point. Yes, absolutely. I don't know. Like, why would you call a play that takes that long to develop when your season is on the line? Questionable for me as well as pressing the full court. Either way, moving on, Bill Self and them Kansas, what are the Jayhawks?

The Jayhawks went down to the vampire. The vampire. You diggle, St. John's, man, Rip Pitino. Choosing the five umpteen times in the last, what, 20 seconds or so, just to get in the penalty. I don't understand that. Why would you want to get in the penalty just to be in the penalty? And guess what? Okay, game winner in your mouth. Let's go home. Did you see that one, sis? I did. And also that kid was like one for 17 on the day. Come on. And ends up getting that layup. And they pan to Rick Petino Juju after they've won the game. And he is looking

just completely unfazed, almost mad looking. Like what are we doing? I was say one ah, ah, ah. Yeah, what, ah, sweet 16. Ah, ah, ah. So this is like, I think the first sweet 16 appearance for the St. John's Johnny since 1999. Come on, man. Listen, man, real quick, got to put some respect on Rick Patino's name.

It doesn't matter where he goes. He literally could go to High Point. He could go to Auburn. He could go to Cal Baptist. He could go to any of these places and turn him into Sweet 16 Elite 18s. That's just what he does. You know who also does that? Sean Miller figures out of way for Texas to be like NC State was a couple of years ago

where they're in the first four. And all of a sudden you're like, I think this might be a final four team. So Sean Miller, as much of a scumbag as he is, he's still an excellent coach at the X's and nose and his team always overperform. So shout out to my man, the vampire, Rick Petino. Because, wow. They're really now set up to give the Duke Blue Devils a nice little punch in the mouth. Exactly.

The only place I know my boy Rick Patino can coach is Transylvania in the daytime because them boys got steaks and silver and everything. You dig it? Come on, man. Moving on, man. Vanderbilt versus Nebraska. Oh my God. The half-court shot that did go in but didn't go in.

Did you see that one, sis? You know what's crazy is like I posted that on threads and I said, we were this close to having Tyler Tanner become a March Madness legend. Right. And there were so many idiots that did not watch the game that thought that I was referring to when Tyler Tanner got the shot off. No, I don't care when he shot it. It didn't go in the hoop.

I showed you the ball is inside the cylinder but did not go down through the net. That's kind of an important piece of making a shot. It was kind of like a little like the reverse of Tyrese Halliburton going up and then down during the finals or actually it was the Eastern Conference. Conference finals. Yeah.

Against the Nix. He was against the Nix. So he was really close, but also Vanderbilt, what are you even doing in that moment? Like you shouldn't even be in that scenario. Mm-hmm. Exactly. And like you said, for those who wasn't watching,

my boy had 20-7. I almost 30. If my boy would have had 30 points, that would have went down as one of the greatest college basketball March Madness guys in the history of the world. deal with it. We still watch Christian

later than that week as fadeaway free throw, don't we? So imagine this. You did. Come on, man. And before we move on to the NBA, bro, did you see Miami?

The U was, it was back for a little while, but they went down in a great game against Purdue Boilermakers. After the game, though, do you know what I mean? Salute to the season.

After the game, though, Miami's Renew, that's how you say his name? My boy had a thirst for some quick, some chicken tenders, man. My boy, my boy spent on tenders, man. I know how it be. You'd be in the marinas and that's, that's, waft over you in the arena. You'd be like, hmm.

What's that? Listen, sometimes you just need something. I don't know what the deal is with they're not feeding these kids. He's got to go up and get the chicken tenders as well. He's not able to end up. up getting the catering for the college kids. Did they run out? Did he have a hankering? The fact that he came up in there in his jersey is absolutely insane. That's the choice, bro. Because you could have slipped on your hoodie, your little warm-up shirt and you warm-up pants. My boy say,

nah, bro, if they're out here at the bar, I want them to seize me. I want people to see me or any tenders just in case, yeah, baby, that would be out there. We just lost, but I had 23. You did. However men the Renew had. But yeah, play a move from me because it's like Snickers say

but hungry, why wait? Got down. Take your ass to the concession stand. You dig it. Back. Moving on to the league, man. We had a lot of drama

over the weekend. A lot coming out of Orlando, man. Did you see any of what happened in Orlando between the Lakers and the magic? Yeah, I think the Lakers doing the intentional missed free throw again?

Like it's just kind of wild that worked for him once. Somehow they still found a way to make it work. I forgot that they even got Luke Kinnard at the deadline, Juju. I'm not going to lie to you. But boy, has he been good for them? 2.6 seconds left to go. Ball goes into his shot and it's just wet, goes in, gives the Lakers another dub.

and I think that's the reason that they got him is for moments like this is to have a sniper, one of the best three-point shooting percentages in the league, but just the way it all went down was fucking chaos. Right, bro.

Did you know that? Stan Van Gundy came on the show and said, Luke Conard is a better three-point shooter than Steph Curry. And so I just want to take this time right here and say, brother, we love Stan Van Gundy at this show.

We will not besmirch his name at all. We would never hear that here. But Stan Van Gundy, boy, stop. Wake up. Lawrence Fishburn in that one movie, what is it, school days? Wake up, Stan Van Gundy, what the hell around with you, man? Have you not seen Steph go over and save the world in France? He saved us.

Just not do that. What you think about him saying that, bro? Is that even kind of fair? No. No. There we go. I don't think that's fair. I mean, I think that Steph Curry will be the best pull-up,

off the dribble we've ever seen in our life. And then Damien Lillard is probably after that. They just happened to be in the same generation. There we go. Steph Curry, obviously, great offball, like, catching shoot shooter as well, as is Dame. I love Luke Kennard, but it's like Stan Van Gundy. It's a little YT bias, fam.

It's a little YT bias. See, that's why you here at the show, sis. It'd be shit, and it'd be right there in my face. I'm like, you cannot say that shit, boy. You better not say that And then he'll come my sister Literally Alley you

Same way It's like listen Don't put him in the same category As Steph Curry Like we love you Stan Right Your lens On hoops

Is clearly Mayanase You need to wipe it out With the thing of your shirt Wipe your lens, Stan You ain't seen her Come on. But I'm moving on

To this game Bruh During the game Luca Donchis got his, what, 16th technical file, meaning that he should be suspended for the next game. They're going to need to rescind that. He had this to say on why he got the technical file. I'm definitely hoping, you know, obviously I let my team down, you know,

getting that last stack. But honestly, I wasn't trying to, you know. He set it free to hold people for a whole family. And at some point, you know, it's his basketball court. some point I just can't stand. I gotta stand up for myself. But I know I got to do better. Martinez, I know they have my bag, so I'll let them down today.

No matter what I'm doing in the world, I don't care if I'm playing foosball. I don't care if I'm playing the World Cup for the penalty shot. You can't tell me you fin the F my whole family cut. Like, bro, what do you think about that, bro? Go God, what's his last name, Batatsi? Batats. Go ahead. this.

The floor is yours. I just I feel like number one there's clearly some Eastern European beef that occurs

and it's really personal. We saw this when Georgia played turkey and Goga jumped Furcon cork moss and they literally the police were involved in the jumping

Like they were also like, uh, and one, yeah. And Gogh is still on probation. He got like a 15,000 foreign currency that I don't recall what it is, C-R-H-C-A-R-F, whatever it's out of. And so he has been pulling shenanigans for ages. Remember he almost, he tried to bite Gary Payton the second or head button him. We don't really know what it was. He kind of is. a little bit violent and a little bit of a shi-stirer and starter.

And I know that we make fun of Luca for complaining and coming after the refs and getting too many technical fouls. But at what point does your manhood and your self-respect and your honor and your dignity and your integrity come into play? There it is. The man said in his foreign tongue, I will fuck your whole family. That's like his daughter. That's his ex-wife that he's in the middle of a custody battle with.

This is his mama. It's any siblings they have. It's male siblings. You better leave my granddad alone. I know that. I mean, we're talking about the threat of rape, Juju. You're not about to threaten me that you're going to rape my whole family. family because they're not giving it to you willingly.

Okay? Exactly. You need to get off my me all right to hell right now. I promise for Goga, you leave my little cousin, bro. I'm surprised Luca did not swing on him. That's where I'm coming from. Like at a certain point, you telling me that that's why you got the technical, I feel like we should have been pulling you off him bit, bro.

The only reason that we're not pulling you off of him is because you must know he still ain't the one to run up. I think it's not. It's very clearly. Right. Right. For you to put that sentence together in front of all these people in here and you know these folks can hear you at the free throw line.

Bro, what's wrong with you, man? I'm not messing with you. You don't, hey, hey, man, I'm going to protect myself. Back up, Goga. It's all I'm saying. But also during that game, we had, bro, that game was so fun, bro. We have fans in the audience that I don't know if they have a solid bra and play at all. This brother, I think LeBron got filed going up.

I forgot who filed him, but it was a hard foul that LeBron hurt his elbow. Miss Rebecca, you got that video of The Bronn lover. Hey, my boy ready to go out there, man. Walks down there, too. Get on. No. Get up, Brian. Exactly.

Exactly. He acted like he was out there with both. in his chest leaking out on the concrete from a drive by I hope somebody love me like that bro if when you got love like that

from random scrangers bruh you're the goat bro you're the king man look here you go brown you drop this my boy was ready to crash out on security the other security this little girl who keep looking at him just because LeBron is out there and he is down and he is flopped

Like LeBron got up, by the way. Shot bow free throws him was okay the rest of the game. He did get up. He is still alive. He's still alive, bro. But look, to that brother, we salute you at the alley because that's the kind of passion we need from every fan in the NBA arena. Moving forward, damn it. No doubt.

That enthusiasm. The Lakers have just been rolling, though. They came out. They got into Miami at, like, I want to say five in the morning. Yeah, yeah, bro. The day of the game. and they put questionable on Luca, Braun,

and Austin Reeves, and they all played, and they all balled, and they came back, and they won. I think they were three and a half point or four and a half point

underdogs, and they ended up smack in Miami on the second night of a back-to-back cross the country. 60. I don't know. I don't know.

Sixth. Get what else? 60. 60. Luca gave them six. Oh, like the Crips.

Brow, come on, brunt. In your face, Lou Cah Donchis. You feel me? What up, Cah? Did you see the fan in the crowd that had the jersey on? He had a Goga jersey on because I guess, hey, Goga is respected in the Orlando streets.

But as soon as the game winning went down, look what my boy did. Loop for three. Snatched the Goga jersey on, the bronze jersey up under. Oh, my God. Look at it. Look. right there. Do you command that Joker or is he committing

one of the worst offenses ever? You can't have two jerseys on underneath one or the other. You can't especially, you got to go like O'Neill, Penny, Cole Anthony, Palo Ben-Carrou, Wendell Carter, Jonathan Isaac. You can't

go Goghapatats and then LeBron. You can't, like, no, no, no, no, no. That's what he's trying to He's like, I'm coming up into Orlando and I'm repping for Goga. But really inside my heart, it's Lakers all day. My boy did the Denzel. I'm leaving here with something.

My boy leaving here with a W. Either way it go, bro, he's hitting the bar. Yeah, but salute, bro. You already know how I'd be. Because you see me today. My Celtics went down to my timber wolves. So I felt like, uh, might as well pull out old Stefan Marr. I see that. I see that she did that.

Neither here nor there. The Celtics, we're going to get it together. They work in it out. This ain't the playoffs. We can lose that one. Who cares if Batman wasn't there, you know? Moving on. Lastly, well, not even lastly. Just right quickly, Jalen, a Jalen is coming back to OKC right quick. Does it matter? Does this make them back the team to beat? Or is it going to be like Jason And Tatum getting back integrated. I'll take a little bit. I think he's going to be good right away. We saw when he came back the last time.

It looked like he was his self instantly. And I felt like OKC's been able to slow play him and allow him to get completely ready and to be an explosive player that's, you know, how he normally wants to function so that there's no real, like, on-ramp. of trying to get back right. So, yeah, I think O.K.C., you've got so many players that are eighth or ninth off the bench.

And those players would start on pretty much any other NBA team. Like, A.J. Mitchell is a starting point guard for 27, 28 teams. You see my boy, AJ over the weekend, though? Come here. Come here, Julian Champagne. Justin, who whichever won you? I take thee. But now he's a lot of

They like to get in the mud a little bit. They like to piss you off. They like to irritate you. They like to get under your skin. Doesn't really matter who and it's working. I mean, you've got Lou Dort there who somewhat is a bit of a dirty player. He's just kind of not a throw away, but like Kaysen Wallace is kind of taking his shine a little bit. You make the trade for Axe Crusoe.

He hasn't been healthy. Isaiah Hartinstein hasn't been healthy. Chet Hongren hasn't been healthy And then you've got Cuban Chet Hong Green Matter of fact Cuban chat You seen his profile picture

I didn't I did not see They put the they put the sexy filter on my boy The AI filter going to commercial And he was like who the hell is this This is AI but he made his profile picture You've got Aaron Wiggins You've got Isaiah Joe They just come off the bench

You got Jared McCain I mean the list goes on Kenrick Williams, he doesn't get a lot of run, but he's played awesome against the San Antonio Spurs specifically. So I think he'll get some run. This team is just not only are they loaded, now you've got players who normally don't get heavy, heavy minutes, who have gotten those regular season heavy minutes

because there's been so many injuries. So now what does that mean in the playoffs? I think it means that they're more ready to go. I think it means that they're more seasoned. In fact, I think that the injury to OK, Casey probably makes them scarier than if they've been healthy this whole year long. Yeah, bro. Sound like it's about to be trouble, trouble.

In that West. Lastly, Steph Curry also on the mend making a return. Now, the warriors have been damn near P.U. God awful. But at West Bottom still has it so that they will be in that playing. Is it going to be dangerous to face Steph in them? boys or is it a little too little a little too late if it would have been one of those scenarios where Houston wouldn't have fallen down in the standings and if they were a two seed

I would feel a lot better about the warriors chances I mean you're talking about a team that's struggling offensively guys can't get their own shots tar east and hasn't hit a bucket since Christmas. His own mom is trolling him online saying, hey, lethal shooter, could you help train my son how to shoot? It's bad. It's bad out here.

You know, Jabari Smith hasn't looked that consistent. It's really like, can we get the ball to KD? Right. And now we got controversy, whether Reed Shepard's playing or not. So if the Warriors were going to play a Houston team that was a two-seat,

then I would say, yeah, like, the Warriors are very seasoned. They've got guys with multiple championships under their belt. And you say, okay, well, like, I'll give it to them. But against the spurs or against the thunder, anyone who's eight or seven, it's a rat for them, completely done. Right, bro. Like, yes, Steph Curry is back, but guess who he's swinging the ball to?

Guy Santos. Come on, man. So salute to my boy, Guy. You salute. You got to know. Okay, butter. Right. You feel me?

We already know. It's the best Jerry curl in the game. That's your soul glow, let it shine through. But they need a little bit more. Looking like Jerome off of Snowfall. And look like that, bro. My sister's been playing sick the whole episode. That's what you don't know.

And now you know, bro. Three-pointer in your mouth. Still, Jerome, snowfowl. Yeah. Yeah. Come on, man. That's going to do it for another episode, man. Any last words on the way out, sis?

Listen, keep watching the tournament. Roof for Arkansas, root for our guy, Darius Aikoff. He's got ice water running through his goddamn veins, juju. I'm going to tell you what. He's going to be one of the most interesting players in the draft in terms of where he gets selected. I think that's probably the biggest question mark for the 26 NBA draft right now. Yeah, bro. Salute to him and AI.

Just signed with Reeba. You got that. man. Also on the way I salute to Katie for Pasad NJ on that scoring list, brother. You say you got four more to go, and I believe, my boy. You did. As always, thank you, Miss Rebecca. Donahue. Come on, man. We love you, sis. And my boy, the distinguished Dylan Hwang.

You got to know, brother. We love you, man. And all the listeners, man, without y'all, who the hell are we? Catch us again this Friday on the Lebertad and Friends page, same bat time. That damn channel. That damn channel.

Lock in. Lock in.