Lakers News: Emo Postgame Austin Reaves Look Goes Viral Instantly

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Yes, your Los Angeles Lakers lost their second straight game to the Denver Nuggets 108-103 last night, and now must somehow win four of the next five games in the Western Conference Finals to advance -- which seems, well, incredibly unlikely. I mean, have you seen the Denver Nuggets this year?
So, sure, the team's season might end a bit earlier than we would like once again.
But darn it, we can still extract some meaning from tragedy.
That's because LA shooting guard Austin Reaves, who had a fairly solid 22 points on 8-of-16 shooting from the floor (5-of-9 from deep), five assists and three rebounds in the loss, emerged for his ceremonial postgame press conference with a very 2004-2008 look, which instantly went viral on Twitter with some very creative emo references.
Exhibit A:
🎵 i chimed in with a hasn’t lebron ever heard of dunking the goddamn ball 🎵 https://t.co/l4JSMkS6Le
— Brian Floyd (@BrianMFloyd) May 19, 2023
That wasn't the only Panic! At The Disco allusion online Thursday.
Panic! At The Crypto https://t.co/mANRjsUVXq
— David Naylor (@ProfCedar) May 19, 2023
Sick burn.
Metalcore/nu-metal platinum rockers Papa Roach, whose singer Reaves pretty closely resembles, got a shoutout:
Cut my life into pieces/
— myles brown (@mdotbrown) May 19, 2023
This is my last resort/
Suffocation, no breathing/
Gotta get DLo off of this court pic.twitter.com/moDOQNZvVX
LA's record was creatively incorporated into a New Found Glory reference:
0-2 Found Glory https://t.co/WgNDb3rOIu
— Joey Gulino (@JGulinoYahoo) May 19, 2023
The Fallout Boy lyrics were flying:
"we're going down, down in five games this round / and sugar, we're going down bricking" https://t.co/GPCXq0SugM
— Hardwood Knocks (@HardwoodKnocks) May 19, 2023
You can probably figure out who this one's about:
Plain White Threes https://t.co/y3CL9Su99Y
— IWas_VelvetJones (@IVelvetjones) May 19, 2023
Dashboard Confessional, the standard-bearers for the early days of the emo movement, got basketball-ified:
Backboard Confessional https://t.co/kN44kHWqt8
— Carlitos Sánchez (@csunchez) May 19, 2023
"Such Great Heights" auteurs The Postal Service (who are, technically, an indie pop supergroup spinoff featuring band members from a few emo bands rather than being emo proper) also received an NBA-core re-brand:
The Low Postal Service https://t.co/4jRuSaWi6y
— jm (@hasty_jasty) May 19, 2023
The Philadelphia Inquirer's Kyle Neubeck threw out some Brand New album titles:
“Austin, do you prefer Deja Entendu or The Devil and God are Raging Inside Me” https://t.co/8jmAimYd57
— Kyle Neubeck (@KyleNeubeck) May 19, 2023
Anthony Davis singing Saves The Day could rule, to be fair:
Saves The Davis. https://t.co/YWNn9x8DGq
— Dustin Dopirak (@DustinDopirak) May 19, 2023
"American Idiot"-era Green Day, invariably, got the Reaves treatment:
Venice Boulevard of Broken Dreams https://t.co/XlFfc0pfB2
— Jasmine (@JasmineLWatkins) May 19, 2023
Never fear, that wasn't the only "Boulevard of Broken Dreams" reference this photograph elicited:
I walk these empty streets
— Jayson (@jasonwithawhy) May 19, 2023
On the boulevard of AD threes https://t.co/398vZaWh3k
Here's another Fallout Boy track for good measure:
This Ain’t a Screen, It’s An Arms Race https://t.co/aUDhyn1mVM
— jake (@JakesBadTweets) May 19, 2023
Jemele Hill of The Atlantic channeled Nine Inch Nails' moody mastermind in her quote-tweet:
What in the Trent Reznor is this? https://t.co/WiBeZJho4S
— Jemele Hill (@jemelehill) May 19, 2023
Imagine Dragons barely qualify as rock, but a drag screen reference is a pretty choice cut, so we're including it here:
Imagine Drag Screens https://t.co/hfw5ZkDKb6
— Anthony F. Irwin (@AnthonyIrwinLA) May 19, 2023
The Reaves picture also inspired a ClutchPoints thread:
Who is this guy? Wrong answers only 😂 pic.twitter.com/gcvvGwP46u
— ClutchPoints (@ClutchPoints) May 19, 2023
Honestly, we're just scratching the surface with this content. There is some absolute gold out there, friends. Happy hunting. If you need me, I'll be blasting some Story of the Year.
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Currently also a scribe for Newsweek, Hoops Rumors, The Sporting News and "Gremlins" director Joe Dante's film site Trailers From Hell, Alex is an alum of Men's Journal, Grizzlies fan site Grizzly Bear Blues, and Bulls fan sites Blog-A-Bull and Pippen Ain't Easy, among others.