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Los Angeles Lakers: Isaiah Thomas plays well offensively in debut

By Nick Ziegler

DALLAS, TX - FEBRUARY 10: Isaiah Thomas #7 of the Los Angeles Lakers reacts as the Lakers play the Dallas Mavericks in the second half at American Airlines Center on February 10, 2018 in Dallas, Texas. The Mavericks won 130-123. (Photo by Ron Jenkins/Getty Images)
DALLAS, TX - FEBRUARY 10: Isaiah Thomas #7 of the Los Angeles Lakers reacts as the Lakers play the Dallas Mavericks in the second half at American Airlines Center on February 10, 2018 in Dallas, Texas. The Mavericks won 130-123. (Photo by Ron Jenkins/Getty Images) /
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On Saturday night, the Los Angeles Lakers were unable to defeat the Dallas Mavericks. However, they saw the debut of Isaiah Thomas.

Coming into Dallas, the Los Angeles Lakers were riding a four-game winning streak. Against one of the worst teams in the Western Conference, they certainly hoped that they would be able to get a win and get closer to the eighth spot in the West.

However, the Mavericks had other plans and they were able to score 130 points in the win. Even though the Lakers performed very well offensively, and even shot a higher percentage from the field, it was the Mavericks who came out with the win.

In the loss, the Lakers did see newly acquired Isaiah Thomas make his debut. As expected, Thomas came off the bench, as he will likely be filling in Jordan Clarkson’s sixth man role. Considering Thomas wasn’t playing very well with the Cavaliers, he looked really good against the Mavericks offensively.

Thomas was able to total 22 points on 7-for-12 shooting from the field and 4-for-8 shooting from the beyond the arc. The Lakers certainly can use Thomas’ ability to shoot three-pointers, and he looked good shooting the ball on Saturday.

Since Thomas was coming off hip surgery, that certainly played a factor in him struggling with the Cavaliers. Considering it was a major surgery, it would have been impossible to think that he would go right back to the MVP-form we saw with him on the Boston Celtics last season. However, we did see Thomas have a bounce in his step.

Thomas was certainly surprised by the fact that he was traded by the Cavaliers. Clearly, the Cavaliers thought they were upgrading when they traded him, and that should be excellent motivation for Thomas for the rest of the season.

Next: Were the Lakers winners at the trade deadline?

While Thomas did perform well on the offensive end, some of his weaknesses were exposed on the defensive side. The Lakers like to switch defensively quite often, and that left Thomas in some really bad situations defensively. Overall, the whole defense didn’t play well against the Mavericks, as Thomas cant be to blame for them scoring 130 points. Even though the Lakers lost on Saturday, Thomas performed quite well in his debut.

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