On their first second consecutive night this season, while missing Alex Caruso and LeBron James and Anthony Davis losing control over whether to play or stay out, the Lakers looked very exactly as tired and disinterested in playing hard in defense as you would expect from a team that is still recovering from the shortest turnaround in NBA history. As a result, it might not be surprising that they lost one to the Portland Trail Blazers, although they still managed to make the game a competitive loss by 115-107, despite their lethargy.
This was a racing game, with the Lakers starting the game by doubling the Blazers by 20-10, but Portland struggled with several races of its own to take a four-point lead at halftime. The Lakers had a 19-3 streak to start the third quarter, but the Blazers never stopped fighting, and Gary Trent Jr. (28 points out of 7-11 deep throws) never cooled.
And although they were apparently in it, the Lakers – in addition to Dennis Schröder – played this game mainly at half speed, except for a few strong stretches, and came back to bite them in the end, when the three of the Blazers continued to fall and the Lakers did not had the margin of error that defending Portland’s previous attempts would have given them. This allowed Portland to make one last big run to open the fourth period and, even as the Lakers tried to close, losing by just six points, they allowed an offensive submission by Jusuf Nurkic’s rebound, which led him to end the game in a jumper of his authorship after assistance from Damian Lillard. The effort was simply not there for the defending champions tonight, which will happen in a strange season like this. It is what it is.
The Lakers had 57-0 last season (including the playoffs) when they led after three quarters. Tonight, they led 85-84 in the 4th Q and lost 115-107. New season, indeed.
– Dave McMenamin (@mcten) December 29, 2020
In addition to Schröder (who finished with 24 points and 4 assists in another solid effort), the rest of the starters did mostly well, since they all ended with a positive (or neutral, exactly 0 LeBron) in plus-minus . Meanwhile, all the Lakers bank players ended up with a negative, in a very clear indicator of where things went wrong tonight, even though the beginners hardly seemed to be entirely themselves, with James and Davis having below average nights for their patterns during the game and coming back from injuries, respectively.
But credit to the Blazers. They clearly wanted this one more and went out and got it. His win will knock the Lakers 2-2 in the season, and LA will have a break on Tuesday to recover before heading to San Antonio to face the Spurs in their first street game of the season. In the meantime, don’t stress out too much with this one. Losses in circumstances like this will happen this season. Don’t worry too much about it, because the team certainly won’t.
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