5 Things: Lakers Rise to the Task

This was a statement win for the Lakers franchise. When star players are hurt it’s up to the unsung teammates to do their best to meet the challenge. The Lakers have not much but vet minimum players to fall back on when one or more of their marquee stars goes down, a thinness much critiqued by Planet Earth and a major source of Pelinka-inspired ire for fans. Last night, for a game at least, those players showed that faith to be warranted as a motley gang of Lakers overcame a mostly healthy and rolling Miami Heat team.

1. Dennis Schroder’s best game by a country mile. This was the version of Flash Laker’s fans had been hoping to see. The unstoppable paint penetrator, the slow-gather but accurate three point shooter, and the drive and dish playmaker. Euro League Schroder, at last! Dennis’ line of 32 pts, 4 boards, 4 steals and 2 dimes was needed in every aspect to manage the win last night. He got to the line 14 times applying pressure on a variety of Miami defenders all game long and taking on the scoring burden left to the team by LeBron’s absence due to illness. The best part was he had only one turnover which helped minimize the 17 turnovers the team coughed up (most of that on Russ). Dennis needs to bottle this game and play with this level of aggression whomever else is on the floor with him from now on.
2. Russell Westbrook’s sloppy but impactful game. There won’t be many wins following a 7 turnover game from Russ. He’s too critical for getting guys easy shots for that to work but for a night we escaped despite a subpar passing game from Westbrook. He nearly had another triple-double off the bench but didn’t chase it. Despite the 7 TOs he did have 9 dimes and 8 rebounds and scored some seriously clutch baskets down the stretch. It gets harder and harder for me to see the team trading Russ and easier and easier for me to see them justifying keeping him the whole season and possibly beyond, for the right price. Best of all Russ seems to have won the fans in the home crowd over with his effort, if not polish.
3. Kendrick Nunn’s best game in a looooong time (maybe the whole season). It had to happen eventually, right? Nunn couldn’t be awful for forever, the guy has too much talent. In limited action Nunn had his most complete and least-forced game in a purple and gold uniform. With Troy Brown Jr. leaving the game early due to another injury his production was desperately needed for a team that has fewer and fewer scoring options to turn to. His line of 9 points on 4-9 shooting (1-3 from downtown) and 3 rebounds won’t ‘wow’ anyone or reverse the general consensus that his MLE signing is one of the worst ever for the Lakers but it’s a clear step in the right direction for a player we all hoped to see more out of but have yet to see it consistently.
4. More high quality Wenyan Gabriel minutes. A lot of players struggle in limited minutes. Wenyan has a simple role and he’s making the most of it and he’s doing that consistently which is the key for bench players. Like Nunn’s, his box score won’t jump out at you but it was efficient and the guy plays so hard that much of what he does by way of keeping possessions alive, fighting for position that allows our guards to grab boards and not pad his own stats are all critical elements of Laker success this season. He may not be playing his way into a massive deal next season but it’s easy to see Wenyan at least sticking around the league as his corner three is rounding into shape, his effort is always there, and he’s playing focused and within his role.
5. What works about the small guard lineup. I’m personally not a huge fan but coach Ham keeps trotting it out so we have to at least take a look at what about the 3-4 guard lineups he is deploying does indeed work. It makes the team harder to guard on the perimeter and allows for more drives to the rim. Schroder and Russ in particular are elite at finding seams and exploding to the hoop for a layup or pass. Now, depending on the defense, those drives can have very mixed results but if the correct read is made more often than not it does have the potential of at least partially offsetting our woebegone outside shooting. It also has problems on the defensive glass that put the onus and burden on Thomas Bryant and Wenyan Gabriel to box out consistently while also covering their man in roll schemes which isn’t easy even for elite defenders. Still, it could end up being a useful tool if we go down to three guards, LBJ and AD or Bryant in the future. For myself, when everyone is healthy, I would hope that some of the potential line ups featuring more size get as extended a look as the small line ups have.

All in all a high quality win and now the winning streak is a legit three whole games. With the hope that we’ll have James back for the next game and AD back before the trade deadline the Lakers a re still in a decent position to make the playin and at least challenge for the 6th seed, Anyone who had said that was a possibility after the 2-10 start when we were all feeling the doom and gloom would likely be lying. Fans resigned themselves to a lost season or hoping a trade would bail us out but then something happened: the Lakers just started to play harder. Not even all that much better, just harder and with more intent. Yes, it also came with a short burst of the potential MVP versions of LeBron and AD but those 2 have played together in a scant 14 games this season, a lot of those were the early losses, as well. So, with 38 games played and coming up on the halfway mark, we need to look for hope in the players who do play consistently to find a way forward. Just like last night.