Luguentz Dort logs a season-high 31 minutes for the Hawks

Luguentz Dort spent more time on the floor than he had all season, and the box score shows what he did with it. In the Atlanta Hawks' 108-104 win at Indiana on November 2, he played 31 minutes. He scored 14 points, grabbed 2 rebounds and recorded 0 assists. The scoring is the part that jumps off the page. The rest of the line is quiet, and a scorer's night usually looks like this one.

Dort is a guard who wears jersey 0 for the Atlanta Hawks. He is 27 years old and in his 7th season in the league. His player page is at Luguentz Dort. The night in Indiana was a different kind of workload for him than anything he had logged in the games before it, and the numbers below set it against his own history rather than anyone else's.

Start with the season average. Across 7 games before this one, Dort averaged 23.7 minutes, so 31 minutes sits well above his normal night. His last 5 games tell the same story at 23.8 minutes. The points gap is wider. He averaged 8.6 points over the 7 games and 8.6 over the last 5, and he finished with 14. Rebounds were 3.1 and 2.6 on those two averages, and he had 2. Assists were 1.6 and 1.8, and he had 0.

The 31 minutes are a season high. His previous best was 29, and his average before this game was 23.7, so he cleared his own ceiling by a clear margin. His share of the team's playing time, 12.9 percent, is also a season high. His previous best there was 12 percent. Both marks were set in the same game. That is not a rounding quirk or a stray stretch. It is the top of his season on two measures at once.

He also started. Dort began the game after starting 0 of his last 5 games, so the box score shows him moving from the bench to the opening lineup and then taking the most minutes he has had this year. The data describes the change and nothing more. It offers no reason for it, and this piece offers none either. What it confirms is that his night began differently from the 5 games before it.

The Hawks won the game on the road. The final was Atlanta Hawks 108, Indiana Pacers 104, a 4-point margin. The result moved Atlanta to 3-4 on the season. The Pacers fell to 2-5. A 4-point game is close enough that every rotation choice sits in the box score, and Dort's 31 minutes were one of the biggest ones on the Hawks' side of it. He finished on the winning end, which is all the standings count.

One more number sharpens the picture. Before this game, his share of the team's playing time averaged 9.9 percent over the 7 games and 9.9 percent over the last 5. On the night in Indiana it was 12.9 percent. That is a jump of a size the season had not shown him. Set it beside the 14 points against his 8.6 average and the Pacers game stands out as his busiest and most productive line of the year so far.