Los Angeles Lakers: 4 Lessons in marathon win against the Phoenix Suns

The Lakers’ defense is starting to show slippage

The Phoenix Suns hit 16 shots from long distance in this game. Most would say, so what? Would you believe ZERO came from their star Devin Booker? Shocking isn’t it.

The Los Angeles Lakers were destroyed from beyond the arc by the Phoenix Suns big men. They all were having career nights against the Lakers.

• Dario Saric shot 4-of-6 from three. He finished with 18 points.
• Aron Baynes shot 4-of-6 from three. He finished with 20 points.
• Frank Kaminsky came off the bench to knock down 2-of-3 from distance. He finished with 16 points. 
• Most already know, Ricky Rubio can’t shoot. Even he knocked down 3-of-6 on his way to 21 points and 10 assists. 

JaVale McGee and Dwight Howard combined for 23 points and 12 rebounds. McGee had a dunk so nasty somebody needed to call his mom, Pam because he knew he was wrong.

But it only counts two points. The point here is this. Opponents are going to use stretch-5s to run the same schemes the Suns did in this game. McGee did not miss in his five attempts and Howard shot 6-of-9, but defensively, they were exposed. Analytics are grossly overused to make false narratives, but in this game, it really mattered and the scheme almost worked.

This is the reason why Frank Vogel wants AD at the five spot.

Defense was optional for most of this game considering that both teams got any look they wanted seemingly every time down the floor. Again, transition defense is getting to be an issue late.

The floor balance is terrible as Ricky Rubio collects the rebound and hits Devin Booker with a pass for an easy layup. The same thing happened in the Toronto game when it was Kuzma that was held out to dry on defense. It wasn’t just the transition defense. The Lakers kept getting beat on back door cuts as well. Slow rotations are apparent as opposed to when the season started.

This will not be an issue against the Warriors in the next game, but Vogel and his coaching staff have a lot of film to watch in the coming weeks.

Golden State comes to the Staples Center in the second game of a back to back affair for the Los Angeles Lakers. Lake Show Life will provide full coverage of the game.