Way back in 2015, the great Gregg Popovich had what the internet came to know as a little mis-step in invoking the Greatest of All-Time while discussing his own young star, Kawhi Leonard.'The San Antonio Spurs coach dared to bring up Michael Jordan a couple times when questioned about Leonard, who was 24 at the time.As time goes on, he's looking less and less silly.At the time, Popovich had this to say when asked about the next step in Leonard's evolution:

“At this point, he’s just trying to figure out what to do when people come after him. He’s getting double-teamed now. That’s a whole different basketball game. So he’s watching Barkley tape and Jordan tape and seeing what those guys did. Those guys were great baiters. They’d get in a situation where they knew where they wanted to go with the pass. Right now, he’s learning when do I try to score, when am I in a crowd, when am I not in crowd, when do I let it go? All those decisions. That’s the part of the game he’s working on."

Later, Popovich was asked about the energy Leonard has to use on both sides of the court, and MJ came up again:

"It’s about how good a player do you want to be? He has the ability to do what a Michael Jordan did at both ends. I don’t mean he’s Michael Jordan, but Michael played both ends of the floor. Kobe does the same thing, when he so desires. You think about the best players in the league, they’re not two-way players. He wants to do that, and he stays after it every day."

Well, in hitting Wednesday night's game-winner against the Indiana Pacers, Leonard did a pretty good impression in the 100-99 victory.

See if you can catch a little MJ in the video here:

With 7 seconds left, Leonard took a pass in the left corner with All-Star Paul George -- one of the league's best defenders -- covering him.

Leonard drove toward the middle of the court, got George on his back and spun towards the sideline for the fadeaway.

All net -- although some Pacers think there was an extra step in there because of a bobble, but that's just not called by NBA refs, especially at that point of the game.

MJ heard plenty of that kind of talk after games too.

Maybe Pop was on to something.