My, things really changed since January. I had tickets to both of the back-to-back Spurs games in Los Angeles scheduled for early January. The wildfires led to the cancellation of the first of those games, as I recounted here. That post ended with this:
In an effort to clear my mind a bit, this morning I rode my bike to the outdoor court near my house to get some shooting in. The court was covered in ash.
Things here had improved enough that the teams were able to play the second game of the miniseries two days later, and I was able to see the Spurs defeat the Lakers 126-102 win. With the score tied at the end of three quarters, the Spurs outscored the Lakers 37-13 in the fourth quarter. Man, that was fun. My post after that game was much more upbeat, both because of the Spurs win and because we woke up the next morning with no more smoke in the air.
I ended with this quote from super-son Pablo and another quote from Laker fan Dan:
It was a tough three quarters to sit through depending on who my dad was sitting next to. That said, I sat next to him in the fourth, and he seemed pretty happy for some reason. I guess he wanted to sit next to me the whole time. Glad the Spurs won! Also great to see their young guys play well.
Dan, long-time Laker fan, was less pleased, though he did accomplish something:
“The Spurs 4th quarter shellacking of the Lakers was so bad, I had to amuse myself with pronouncing (Sandro) Mamukelashvili’s name until I got it just right.”
And he did.
More importantly, we woke up the next morning with clear skies, and no smoke anywhere on the horizon. While Los Angeles is not completely out of the woods yet, as it still hasn’t rained in many months, we just might be past this catastrophe. Let’s get those shirts to the first responders. Next comes the rebuilding.
Two months later, the rebuilding of Los Angeles has only just begun. But the two teams who played last night sure looked different than the teams who played in January. For the Spurs, Victor Wembanyama is out for the season, Tre Jones and Zach Collins were traded away, and Charles Bassey has joined Victor on the DL. All of them played for the Spurs in that January game — especially Victor, who had a plus-26 for the game. Not coincidentally, the Spurs’ margin of victory was 24. Of course, since January the Spurs also acquired De’Aaron Fox, who is also now out for the season, so we missed seeing him play last night.
In some ways, the Lakers had even more drastic changes. Two of their starters from January, Anthony Davis and Max Christie, were traded, while two other starters, LeBron James and Rui Hachimura, missed last night’s game because of injury. As a result, the Lakers last night had only one starter who also started in January. As a spoiler alert, that one starter, Austin Reaves, led all scorers with 30 points, 7 boards and 6 assists.
But the Lakers big story last night, and virtually every night since the trade with the Mavs, is Luka Doncic. He flirted with yet another triple double last night and dominated the game whenever he was on the floor. Well, except for the times on offense when an exhausted, and he stood on the sideline opposite the ball, hands on his knees, trying to catch his breath. Other than that, he was doing Doncic stuff: controlling the ball and often ending with a perfect pass to either a dunker or three-point shooter. Jovan Buha at The Athletic documents how Doncic has changed the Lakers:
Dončić is averaging 31.0 points, 9.4 rebounds and 9.6 assists on 40.8/39.5/79.7 shooting splits. Doncic isn’t shooting the way he wants to as he battles several lower-body injuries, but he has continued to get to the free-throw line and fill up the stat sheet as the driving force of the offense.
His arrival has changed the geometry of LA’s offense. The Lakers have actualized Redick’s preseason vision of becoming a high 3-point volume team, one of the primary offensive principles in the modern era.
The Lakers are attempting 42.3 3-point attempts per 100 possessions since Dončić made his debut on Feb. 10, the second-highest mark in the NBA over that stretch. Before that date, the Lakers averaged 34.3 3-point attempts per 100 possessions, which ranked 26th in the league. With Dončić on the floor, the Lakers’ 3-point frequency increases by 6 percent, a mark that ranks in the 94th percentile league-wide, according to Cleaning The Glass.
Last night after yet another wide-open three by the Lakers, I turned to my companions and said, “Time for the coach to call a time out to tell the Spurs to stop allowing wide-open threes,” followed by Mitch Johnson calling a time-out to tell the Spurs to stop allowing wide-open threes.
Of the Lakers 48 three-point attempts, 34 were classified as wide-open. At the game, it felt like more. The Lakers ended with four more made threes than the Spurs, along with six more made free throws in a game that it never felt like the Spurs were going to win. Which surely disappointed these two Wembanyama fans as they left the arena:
Other thoughts
In the January game, Stephon Castle had a great game. Along with Victor, he was the key to the win. Last night, he did not play well, even though he led the team in scoring with 23. My friends and I decided that everyone who did not watch last night’s game would look at Castle’s stat line and decide that this was another positive step in his Rookie of the Year quest. Those of us saw both of the games against the Lakers know that only the first one was actually a good game for the youngster.
The Lakers’ youngster, Bronny James, is not nearly as talented as Castle, but Laker fans really root for him. When the Lakers’ lead got big early in the fourth, a, “We want Bronny” chant rolled through the arena. J.J. Reddick finally put Bronny in for the last two minutes, and the place went wild. It went even wilder when Bronny made a three-pointer from in the front of the Laker bench. Some comedy screen-writers in the building started an “MVP” chant. Pablo wondered aloud whether Bronny likes being treated like the walk-on at the end of the Duke bench near the end of a blow-out in Cameron. Good question.
Man, the Spurs could use a big man. Down the stretch, they essentially played with only guards and wings. At times, Keldon Johnson was the only Spur on the floor who is even arguably a power forward.
Despite the Spurs’ lack of size, no one on the Lakers ever tried to post up. In the fourth quarter, a switch put Chris Paul on Lakers center Jaxon Hayes, but the Lakers did not even look into the post. Instead, Austin Reaves decided the best match-up was Reaves vs. Spurs center Bismack Biyombo. And he was right. “Back in the day,” the goal was to get a big on a small, dump the ball into the post, and let the big guy overpower the small. The entire league appears to have decided that the better strategy now is to force the big to cover the small, and outquick the big to the rim — or pull up for a thee over a back-pedaling big. A huge change in the game.
Another “back in the day” comment. Back when the Spurs were good, or earlier this year when Victor played, I saw a lot of Spurs gear at Lakers games. Last night, not so much. One Ginobili jersey, the two Wembanyama jerseys pictured above, a woman hooper from North Carolina who grew up a Tim Duncan fan, and a guy in a classic Robinson #50. Oh, and me in my Spurs fiesta quarter-zip, styling it. The game wasn’t exactly fun, but it was still good to be there to see my team and a precious few of my fellow Spurs fans.