The Los Angeles Lakers have sent a strong message to the rest of the Western Conference.
The record that they have doesn’t have anything to do with a soft schedule. It has something to do with the fact that if they are focused on the defensive end and rebound, the opponent may not see triple digits.
I’m sending the message out to the rest of the NBA. The Lakers are not championship contenders, but good luck playing this bunch in a playoff series when they are committed to defense for 48 minutes.
🎥 Lakers dominate from start to finish on the second night of a back-to-back, beating Memphis, 111-88 #LakersWin pic.twitter.com/L08v996AAX
— Los Angeles Lakers (@Lakers) December 9, 2018
The Los Angeles Lakers went to Memphis with bad intentions and beat down the Grizzlies 111-88 in a game that was controlled from the tip. With the win, the Lakers leapfrogged the Grizzlies in the conference standings regaining their 5th slot that they lost 24 hours earlier. The Lakers move their record to 5-1 in the second game of back to backs this season.
It was quite an impressive performance after a very disappointing loss to the Spurs…
Los Angeles Lakers: 5 Lessons from the loss to the Spurs
Los Angeles Lakers lose twice on Friday. They lost to the Spurs 133-120 in a back to back. With the loss the Los Angeles Lakers lose the season series!
It was very obvious that the Lakers had a very bitter taste in their mouths after blowing a 15-point lead, before completely falling apart defensively in the 4th quarter. Against Memphis, the Lakers dominated the backboards out-rebounding Memphis 57-36.
In a game the Lakers needed to control the pace, they did it in spades basically running the Grizz out of their own arena. They used Memphis’ pace against them by holding them to 40 percent shooting. In other words, the Memphis Grizzlies could not score. The Lakers led as much as 29 points in this game and outside of a mini run in the third quarter by Memphis, the Lakers made sure that there was no repeat performance of blown leads from the prior game.
The Lakers did a great job of holding Memphis’ two stars, Marc Gasol and Mike Conley to sub par performances with 11 and 12 points respectively.
This was a team effort, but these guys really stood out!
Here are my lessons…