Lakers Blow A 32-Point Night From LeBron James, Fall To Kings 116-111
Tonight, your Los Angles Lakers, sans Anthony Davis, commemorated Dr. Jerry Buss Night at Crypto.com Arena by throwing away a very winnable game late to a visiting Sacramento Kings team missing perhaps its best player, All-Star center Domantas Sabonis.
LA galloped to an early lead behind the ageless play of superstar power forward LeBron James. One superlative two-way sequence helped kick the quarter into high gear, with the Lakers leading by just a point, 17-16. King James turned a block on Harrison Barnes into a dunk on the other end.
The Lakers went on to outscore the Kings, 22-12, through the rest of the quarter. James scored nine points on 4-of-5 shooting from the floor. Three bench players (Westbrook, Nunn and Gabriel) each had six points a pop. Rookie shooting guard Max Christie even made an appearance in the first quarter again, as Darvin Ham continues to tinker with his rotations.
During the start of the second quarter, things continued apace, with the Lakers leading comfortably, while even Russell Westbrook got cooking:
Unfortunately for LA, that's about when De'Aaron Fox woke up. He helped the Kings capitalize on a late-quarter Lakers scoring drought that lasted for over three minutes). The Kings outscored LA 33-21 in the frame, as the Lakers' shooting luck in the first quarter evaporated in the second. At the half, Sacramento led by a point, 61-60. Fox led all scorers with 20 points at the break, while James had 18 of his own on 6-of-11 shooting from the floor and 5-of-6 shooting from the charity stripe.
Sacramento got off to a blistering start in the third quarter, and eventually eked out an 88-75 advantage with 2:16 remaining in the frame. A trio of Lakers guards willed the club back into the game late, as the offense Russell Westbrook, Max Christie and Kendrick Nunn and the defense of Troy Brown Jr. helped Los Angeles close on an 8-2 run. This trimmed the Kings' lead to 90-82 heading into the final period.
Westbrook and Christie carried over their hot third-quarter finish (one bricked early shot clock Westbrook triple notwithstanding) in the fourth. Westbrook made... back-to-back threes for some reason (he's shooting 29.4% from deep this season).
At one point, Darvin Ham tried a rotation with LeBron James jumping center against fill-in Sacramento starter Richaun Holmes for a mega-small ball lineup of 6'3" Westbrook at the point, 6'3" Dennis Schroder at shooting guard, 6'2" Kendrick Nunn at... small forward, 6'6" Juan Toscano-Anderson at power forward, and 6'9" LeBron at the five spot. He almost had no choice, as while starting center Thomas Bryant has had a great run on offense lately, he's just not much of a defender.
LeBron James did what LeBron James does best as a scorer: get buckets by putting his shoulder down and driving into the paint:
After tying things up 101-101 with six minutes remaining in regulation, the two teams stayed fairly level as the game clock wound down. Heading into the final minute, the score was knotted up again, 108-108.
Harrison Barnes drove in for a layup, but for some reason Russell Westbrook decided to foul him without preventing the shot, meaning it soon became an and-one play.
LeBron James, who had another shaky game from three-point land, pulled some typical "Old LeBron" chicanery that he can sometimes fall into at the end of games when he gets a little tired, and forced up a triple heave with plenty of time left on the shot clock.
Holmes rebounded the ball and Sacramento took a timeout with 30.4 seconds left. Ham did a little hockey substituting down this final stretch with Max Christie and Kendrick Nunn. With LA poised to play defense, Ham brought in Christie. The Kings played keep-away until Juan Toscano-Anderson was compelled to foul De'Aaron Fox with just 12 seconds remaining in the game. Fox split his free throws, putting Sacramento up 112-108.
Ham quickly brought in Nunn for Christie, and Nunn responded with a surprisingly clutch 25-foot triple with just seven seconds left. Nunn clearly tried to draw a foul on Fox as he released, but officials weren't buying it:
The Lakers had to play the foul game in the contest's closing seconds and that was all she wrote.
James led the way for LA in the loss with 32 points on 11-of-25 shooting, nine assists and eight rebounds, a steal and a block. No other starter had more than eight points, as Darvin Ham again allocated more minutes to Wenyen Gabriel (23:33) than he did to Thomas Bryant (18:32). Gabriel responded with 10 points on 5-of-8 shooting, six rebounds, an assist, a steal and a block. Westbrook scored 19 points, grabbed eight rebounds and dished out five assists. Nunn scored 14 points on 5-of-8 shooting (4-of-6 from deep) and registered a team-best +18. Christie was terrific in his 27:10, scoring 12 points on 3-of-8 shooting (2-of-6 from deep) from the field, grabbing three rebounds, swiping two steals and dishing out a dime.
With the loss, LA falls to a 20-25 record on the season. Thanks in large part to De'Aaron Fox's 31-point evening, the Kings were able to win their fifth straight game and improve their record to 25-18.
