The MVP race felt settled. Then Luka Doncic dropped 60. The performance did more than extend the Los Angeles Lakers’ winning streak to eight games; it forced a conversation shift across the league, including from one of its loudest voices.

On Friday morning’s episode of First Take, Stephen A. Smith publicly reversed his stance on the MVP race, admitting he had been wrong to leave Doncic out of the conversation. The admission carried weight precisely because it did not come quietly and because Smith had been one of the more stubborn holdouts.

“I think this, this dude is electrifying. He’s a scoring sensation. He’s a superstar in this league,” Smith said on First Take this morning. “I’m ashamed that I hadn’t brought up Luka for league MVP consideration sooner than this morning. That ends now. That gets corrected right now. Luka Dončić has been sensational. The Los Angeles Lakers have been incredibly impressive on an eight-game winning streak. He scored over 30 in each one of those games.”

The reversal didn’t come out of nowhere. It followed one of the most dominant scoring stretches of the season, capped by a 60-point performance against the Miami Heat in a 134-126 win.

Despite arriving in Miami at four in the morning, Doncic controlled the game from start to finish. The Lakers did not just win. They dictated the tempo behind their lead guard’s scoring burst.

“He (Luka Doncic) scored 100 over the last two games. I mean, I’m looking at the breakdown in terms of what he shot. He shot 43% in the second, in the first quarter, 57% in the second quarter, 60% in the third quarter, and of his 20 points, it was on 83% shooting in the fourth quarter. The brother is just doing his thing,” Smith added.

That quote only scratches the surface of what this run actually looks like on paper. Doncic has scored 327 points over the last eight games, averaging 40.9 points on 50% shooting from the field and 42% from three. He has added 8.9 rebounds, 7.4 assists and 2.4 steals per game during that stretch, while the Lakers have outscored opponents by double digits.

Consequently, Los Angeles has surged to third in the Western Conference. And the MVP conversation has started to move with them. Before this run, Doncic was not viewed as a serious top-three contender.

Shai Gilgeous-Alexander remained the clear frontrunner, with Nikola Jokic and Victor Wembanyama also ahead in most discussions. Smith himself had not included Doncic in that tier.

All of that changed this week. “40.9 points on 50% shooting from the field, 42% shooting from three-point range with 8.9 rebounds per game, 7.4 assists, 2.4 steals. The Lakers outscoring opponents by 10 points….This dude is doing stuff that no other Laker has ever done, where every statistical thing that matters in basketball annals, there’s a Laker associated with something…Luka Doncic in a Los Angeles Laker uniform is a top candidate for league MVP honors. I’m announcing it right here this morning.”

That declaration reflects momentum as much as math. Betting markets have responded accordingly. Doncic’s odds have surged into the second tier behind Gilgeous-Alexander, reinforcing that this is no longer a fringe case but a legitimate push.

The race isn’t decided, and it would be premature to say otherwise. Gilgeous-Alexander remains the favorite, backed by team success and season-long consistency. Because of that, Doncic’s late surge must sustain itself to fully shift voter sentiment.

Late-season pushes like this one have reshaped MVP races before. Similar surges have forced voters to reconsider earlier assumptions, where dominant stretches redefine the narrative in real time.

Doncic’s current run fits that pattern. But what separates it from a mere hot streak is the team record underneath it. The Lakers are 8-0 during this run.

They have climbed to a top-three seed. They are winning with offensive control rather than narrow margins. Doncic’s case, in other words, isn’t just statistical. It’s situational.

Stephen A. Smith’s Rare Shift Extends Beyond Luka Doncic

The broader story here isn’t just Doncic – it’s what this run has done to the Lakers’ reputation as a contender. Head coach JJ Redick’s system is now producing consistent results, while the supporting cast continues to elevate its level of play.

At the center of that is a partnership that is redefining roles. “I gave praise yesterday to LeBron James because, damn it, he deserves it. We’re not going to be shy about that,” Smith said on the show.

“The Los Angeles Lakers are winning as a top-three seed in the Western Conference, okay? They’re winning basketball games. He (Doncic) is leading the way, and he has an individual in LeBron James who is on the Mount Rushmore of basketball, still playing like an All-Star caliber player, and he has to be deferential because Luka is that great. He’s that unstoppable,” Smith added.

LeBron deferring genuinely, willingly deferring, is its own kind of story. LBJ remains productive. Austin Reaves continues to score. The roster is functioning with clarity.

All of it is translating directly into wins, which is the only thing that ultimately matters in an MVP argument.

Stop and sit with this for a moment: Doncic now has more 60-point games than LeBron James, Kevin Durant, Shaquille O’Neal and Dirk Nowitzki combined.

That is not a supporting data point. That is the whole argument in a single sentence.

None of it guarantees him the MVP; voters reward full seasons, not final months. However, it forces reconsideration. The race now sits between sustained dominance and late momentum. Gilgeous-Alexander represents consistency across the season. Doncic represents a surge that is impossible to ignore.

Because of that, the final stretch of games will decide everything. If the Lakers hold their position near the top of the West and this level of production continues, the conversation will not just tighten. It will flip. And if that happens, Friday morning may be remembered as the moment when the narrative first changed.