Pat Spencer, the 2019 Tewaaraton Award winner who is fighting for the one of the Golden State Warriors’ final roster spots in training camp, has earned praise from Warriors head coach Steve Kerr.

The Loyola alum who spent a graduate season playing basketball at Northwestern played his best game to date on Tuesday night, scoring 11 points on 5 of 9 shooting (1-for-2 from three) with five rebounds, three assists and one steal.

His driving dunk through the Portland Trail Blazers’ defense made reigning NBA Finals MVP Stephen Curry go crazy on the broadcast.

PAT SPENCER DROPS THE HAMMER!!

Steph was HYPED on the broadcast mic pic.twitter.com/eVEqfkkbjT

— NBA (@NBA) October 12, 2022

In the postgame press conference, Kerr told Jason Dumas of the Bay Area’s KRON4 News and other reporters that Spencer has impressed.

“Big fan of Pat’s,” Kerr said. “Great competitor. Great athleticism in terms of his balance and his coordination and his core strength. Jumps with more explosiveness than I realized. He had that play in Tokyo where he tried to dunk on the whole team and got fouled. I love that he’s a lacrosse guy. I think that sports like soccer, hockey, lacrosse establish a vision that you need in basketball where you have to see the court in front of you.”

In three preseason games, Spencer — who was signed to an Exhibit 10 non-guaranteed contract in July — has averaged 5.7 points on 50 percent shooting, 3 rebounds and 2 assists per game. He’s also shot 100 percent (6-for-6) from the free-throw line and has played in 14.3 minutes per game.

But at 26 years old with limited high-level basketball experience, Spencer likely remains a long shot to make the roster of the defending NBA champions.

“He needs to play,” Kerr said. “He just doesn’t have a ton of basketball experience, but he’s a really intriguing prospect.”