Lakers News: Nikola Jokic And Co. Overpower L.A. 110-99
Your Los Angeles Lakers fought valiantly for much of the night, but ultimately just could not contain the Denver Nuggets during an explosive third quarter. L.A. fell to 0-4 on the year. Even with starting point guard Russell Westbrook shelved (Austin Reaves started instead), L.A. continued to struggle with its shooting.
One of the silver linings of this Lakers season is that this younger, more athletic L.A. roster has shown a willingness to defend at a high level.
Los Angeles looked to get Davis cooking early. He went 4-of-9 from the field for eight points, pulled down four boards and dished out three dimes. Denver led at the break, 26-22.
After a rare scoreless first quarter, LeBron James looked reinvigorated in the second. To wit:
Bruce Brown was killing L.A. throughout the first half, and is just the kind of fun fill-in-the-cracks kind of role player that would totally evade Rob Pelinka's gaze in free agency. In the first half, Brown had a team-high 16 points on 6-of-8 shooting (including 4-of-5 from three) for the Nuggets.
Davis's formerly-celebrated midrange game has continued to look rusty, despite the Brow claiming to have fully recovered from the wrist injury that hampered his shot for much of the 2021-22 season.
L.A. finished the second frame on a mini-run, going 13-4 during the final 2:32 of the half. Walker and Davis were responsible for most of the damage. For the half, AD led L.A. with 16 points on 8-of-14 shooting, plus five rebounds and three assists. Davis also had the game-tying flush (courtesy of a LeBron James find):
Walker chipped in 11 points on 5-of-9 shooting from the floor (1-of-3 from deep). James had a quiet start, scroing seven points on 3-of-8 shooting. Troy Brown Jr. became a meaningful part of L.A.'s rotation, since he actually can defend wings. He played for 15:54 minutes in the first half alone, more than any other Laker reserve.
Reaves didn't look to score much, but was efficient when he did, going 2-of-3 from the floor (1-of-2 from long range) in the half for five points.
The third quarter marked the moment everything went to hell. The Nuggets outscored the Lakers 32-17 in the frame. Jokic himself chipped in 10 points during the frame, finishing the period with 23 points, 12 rebounds, and seven assists. Jamal Murray and ex-Laker Kentavious Caldwell-Pope served as big contributors.
The Lakers' shooting remained cold in the frame, with L.A. shooting a paltry 6-of-18 from the floor. Denver connected on 14-of-23 of its field goals.
The happiest moment of the frame for L.A. was LeBron James making blazing yet another trail in the NBA history books: he has scored in double digits across 1100 straight games, the longest-ever such streak, per Clutch Points.
We were promptly treated to a bit of a LeBron-a-thon at the start of the fourth frame. Darvin Ham decided to bring out some big guns to kick off the fourth quarter, with 15th man Matt Ryan suiting up and promptly nailing a triple. Brown, who dished out to Ryan for the trey, was also a part of this lineup that helped L.A. go on an 8-0 run against the Nuggets' scrubs to get Los Angeles with single digits, 86-79.
With 9:21 remaining, head coach Michael Malone decided to stop the bleeding. He subbed out ex-Laker DeAndre Jordan and Davon Reed in exchange for Nikola Jokic and Bruce Brown. Ham used the stoppage in play to swap out Patrick Beverley, in the midst of yet another poor shooting night, in favor of Lonnie Walker IV.
The big issue with playing Matt Ryan is that, well, Matt Ryan giveth (threes) and Matt Ryan taketh away (fouls). Quickly after nailing his triple, Matty Ice fouled solid Nuggets rookie Christian Braun. Oh well.
Ham brought in Beverley and Reaves for some ball handling over the shooting of Ryan and the defense of Brown... and then the game got out of hand.
With Denver leading 108-92 at the 2:34 mark, Darvin Ham raised the white flag, bringing in a deep-bench lineup of Ryan, Kendrick Nunn, Damian Jones (who also saw some rotation minutes in the second quarter), Wenyen Gabriel and rookie Max Christie.
Anthony Davis was L.A.'s MVP, finishing with 22 points, 14 rebounds, five assists, three steals, and two blocks. After he landed awkwardly following a botched rebound, Davis seemed to re-aggravate the lower back injury that has hampered him off and on since preseason. He appeared to spend the rest of the night somewhat limited by the back, but, given how terrible the team's other centers are, AD still wound up battling Jokic for 37 minutes. To be fair, he grimaces basically every other time he lands, so maybe the injury isn't something we need to be too worried about going forward:
Unfortunately for Los Angeles, Nikola Jokic poured in 31 points, pulled down 13 rebounds, dished out nine assists, and swiped four steals. The two-time MVP just could not be stopped:
Four other Nuggets scored in double digits, including every other starter not named Aaron Gordon.
The shooting numbers between the two clubs were actually fairly similar. L.A. shot 44.4% on 90 field goal attempts, and went 8-of-30 from deep (26.7%). Denver made 45.7% of its 92 field goal looks, and went just 9-of-34 from deep (26.5%).
Denver got to the line a bit more frequently and was more effective from there as well, going 17-of-21 (81%) from the free-throw line. Los Angeles shot just 11-of-16 (68.8%) from the charity stripe.
The big difference tonight came in Denver's ability to score while pushing the pace. The Nuggets outscored your Lakers 35-18 in fast break points.
