The Los Angeles Lakers began their lives without LeBron James, who It is expected to lose at least one or two weeks With a tense groin, Monday with a loss by road 111-108 against the Brooklyn Nets.
Luka Dončić finished with 22 points, 12 assists and 12 rebounds, his second triple-double since he joined the Lakers, but without James on the floor, the networks threw everything to Dončić on the defensive and the Lakers could not make them pay.
It is not a terribly surprising development given the circumstances. These superstars that are ranked by defenses can only do a lot if the other boys are not taking advantage of the defense overloaded when making the play 4 against 3 in the rear.
That requires time and rhythm, the old cliché of all is on the same page, which is easier to say than to do for a team like the Lakers that has added a piece as dominant as Dončić and is launching many alignments that have not played a lot of time together.
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Now, when you have two players as intelligent and skilled as Dončić and James on the court, especially together, you can cover up many of these “knowing” sprains that generally have been exercising time.
But without James, not to say anything about its own production, the most subtle of the connections that maintain a NBA The offensive that flows becomes much more difficult to execute on the march with an initial alignment (Dončić with Austin Reaves, Dalton Knecht, Gabe Vincent and Alex Len) who, before Monday night, had not played a single minute together, for cleaning.
It wasn’t just James what was out, either. It was Dorian Finney-Smith and Rui Hachimura as well. And just when Jaxson Hayes was really starting to settle as the exact type of short roll connector that he can often does, cutting these bombing defenses, he was also out, and it was Len in that place.
Even so, the Lakers coach JJ Redick was not humorous for excuses after the game. Redick categorized the performance of his team as a “very low level communication game” and said that “being on the tray is [not] An excuse of how we play basketball tonight. “
“I think it was just a general mentality to take shortcuts tonight,” said Redick. “20 points scored in the game [defensively]. They had 16 offensive rebounds. We saw the ball all night. They probably made six or seven 3 not contained. Only shortcuts. You want to be a good team, you want to win in the NBA, you have to do things difficult.
“We couldn’t even pass each other,” Redick continued while visibly frustrated. “We couldn’t participate in our offensive. Running on ball screens literally in Half Court … I don’t know what we were doing.”
Dončić, despite being extremely effective as creator of games and creator downhill, has not fired well with the Lakers, and he did not shoot well with the Mavericks before being changed. He made only eight of 26 shots on Monday while he lost seven of his 10 triples.
“[We] I should have made better decisions, “said Dončić.” I think we start the game doing a very good job, good decisions. But then we release the rope. We got comfortable. “
This would have been a great night for Reaves to take a step forward in the absence of James, but he was also out, ending 3 of 14 and 1 for 5 of 3.
“I thought I played incredibly badly,” Reaves admitted. “When Bron goes out, I have to be better, and I didn’t, and that is one of the reasons we lost.”
The Nets (22-42) do not facilitate life to anyone. Finally they seem to have embraced the incentive that the rest of the way have to accumulate and lost seven in a row before Monday. But even when they lose good teams they push them to the limit.
Within that losing streak of seven games, they uploaded 22 in the Warriors and led Oklahoma City in the last quarter. It is not shocking that they would beat the Lakers team without James, even if Redick and the company will not use it as an excuse, as they should not.
Because the reality is that James will come out for a little decent, and the next calendar of the Lakers is not a walk with his next six games against Milwaukee, Denver, Phoenix, San Antonio and Denver and Milwaukee again.
And these are crucial games, for saying at least. With the defeat on Monday, the Lakers (40-23) were left behind Denver, who beat Oklahoma City, No. 3 in the west (tied in the loss column), and is just a game in No. 4 Memphis and two in No. 5 Houston with 19 remaining games.
