Monday night's loss to the Nuggets on a last-second Jamal Murray buzzer beater was a hard pill to swallow for the Los Angeles Lakers. After building a 20-point lead, it looked like LA would finally get the Denver monkey off their back and head back home with a well-earned 1-1 series split.
But instead, the same script we have seen time and again with these two teams played out yet another time. The Nuggets, being the playoff-tested, veteran-laden, clutch-performing team that they are, simply outclassed the Lakers down the stretch and made the right play over and over again.
It was Denver's 10th consecutive win over LA, and this team feels no closer to finally beating the defending champs than they did two days ago. The game of course drew a lot of eyes and attention, particularly on social media. On Tuesday, Magic Johnson even joined the Lakers-Nuggets discussion.
The Hall of Fame point guard and former President of Basketball Operations in the Lakers front office, Magic has a lot of obvious connections with the organization, and as a result, his opinion matters. So many took notice when he gave his candid take on LA's discouraging loss in Denver on Monday.
The Lakers have nobody to blame but themselves. They did everything they were supposed to do but win the game! AD and LeBron both did their part, they got scoring help from Russell, and they still lost.
— Earvin Magic Johnson (@MagicJohnson) April 23, 2024
Magic Johnson did not hold back after the Lakers' loss
Many basketball fans even outside the Lakers sphere are aware that Magic is an avid NBA viewer. He seems to have a continued genuine appreciation for the game and takes his time to tweet about games, highlighting fun moments or impressive performances wherever he can. Of course, he is always chiming in on whatever is happening with the Lakers as well.
On Tuesday, Johnson took to Twitter as many Laker fans did to express his frustration with the team and what they allowed to transpire late Monday night. His words were pointed and intentional: "The Lakers have nobody to blame but themselves. They did everything they were supposed to do but win the game! AD and LeBron both did their part, they got scoring help from Russell, and they still lost."
Magic's words certainly ring true. There is a lot of blame-shifting when it comes to this loss, with D'Angelo Russell and LeBron James both calling out the referees for their mistakes, and others from the outside blaming the coaching staff. At the end of it all, everyone in the Lakers' locker room can point the blame where they would like, but they should ideally be looking inward.
Blowing a 20-point lead is not an accident, and it is not something fluky that happened solely because of human error by a referee on one play. Frankly, it was a collective meltdown by everyone involved, and failure by anyone to take accountability should be looked at as a huge red flag.
The Lakers are a Thursday night loss away from their season ending, for all intents and purposes. The sooner they can lay down their pride and take collective responsibility for not getting the job done in Game 2, the better their chances will be to come together and have a chance of making this a series again.