The Los Angeles Lakers started the 2019 preseason with a bang. We take a look at their victory over the Golden State Warriors and share four lessons learned.
The Los Angeles Lakers started their championship journey with a preseason game against the Golden State Warriors. The Lakers thoroughly dominated the conference champs in their new arena. Lake Show Life dusts off Lake Show Life lessons analyzing the beat-down of Golden State.
The Lakers got a chance to show their brand new franchise player in Anthony Davis on Saturday night against the five-time Western Conference champion, Golden State Warriors. What the Lakers fan base is trying to figure out now is the ceiling for Davis because he put on a Wilt Chamberlain like performance. Lakers fans, we’re talking about just the first quarter.
Anthony Davis really made the Warriors look small, scoring 17 points on 7-of-11 shooting and collecting seven rebounds. When he was on the floor with LeBron James (More on these two separately later!) the Lakers were almost unguardable.
The Warriors started small with Willie Cauley-Stein out with an injury, but it really wouldn’t have mattered in this game.
17 PTS | 7-11 FGM | 7 REB
— NBA (@NBA) October 6, 2019
Anthony Davis does it all for the @Lakers in the opening frame on @NBAonTNT! #LakeShow #NBAPreseason pic.twitter.com/A8TYID7RKy
The Lakers spoiled the grand opening of the Chase Center for the Warriors dropping them rudely 123-101. It’s difficult to say that a 20 point win doesn’t articulate the dominance of the Lakers but it really didn’t.
The Los Angeles Lakers wanted to change the identity of the team and on this night, they changed theirs and possibly showed the NBA the change in the Warriors identity. Frank Vogel brought out his big lineup with JaVale McGee, Anthony Davis and LeBron James in the frontcourt and it seemed like the Warriors were intimidated as the Lakers raced out to an 11-0 lead and led by as many as 25 points in the game.
They were so good that Magic Johnson was chilling out on Twitter to show his support on what was going on in the game.
Man, after he quit about an hour before the season finale against the Blazers or the First Take interview, did anyone see this coming?
Laker Nation, I just watched Lebron and Anthony Davis put on a show in the 1st quarter of the Lakers vs. Warriors exhibition game. Watch out rest of the NBA!
— Earvin Magic Johnson (@MagicJohnson) October 6, 2019
The rest of the preseason work will be centered around the lineups Vogel puts in around Davis and LeBron when one is off the floor. Some of the lineups proved that Vogel will be tinkering with the lineups, like a lot. Something he shared with ESPN.
"“We’re going to mix it up every night throughout the preseason and potentially into the season,” Vogel said before the game. “The guys are going to have opportunities to start just to see different (combinations). The preseason is just about combinations.”"
One combination that Vogel used that raised a few eyebrows was seeing Troy Daniels in the game before Alex Caruso, who did not play in the first half. It did work for the most part with Daniels leading the bench with 14 points on 6-of-11 shooting. What’s more important is that he dropped a couple of 3-pointers with one coming from “Curry land”.
With the constant flash around Alex Caruso this offseason, it will be interesting how he will be used. He had a plus/minus of +17, scoring 10 points, dishing out six assists and grabbed three rebounds.
https://twitter.com/Lakers/status/1180661394724675584
Even though Caruso played well, Lake Show Life has already laid out questions about the expectations Caruso should be handled.
The Lakers will have a long, but happy flight to China to play the Brooklyn Nets twice. The first game will be on October 10th. But that’s next week.
Let’s talk Lake Show Life lessons of Saturday night.