Scott Polacek@@ScottPolacekIncluded Columnist IVNovember 24, 2024
Adam Pantozzi/NBAE through Getty Images
The Los Angeles Lakers are so familiar with their resist the Denver Nuggets they had a group conference about it before Saturday’s video game.
Rui Hachimura exposed as much when he informed press reporters before the contest (40-second mark), “We simply discussed it before practice, in the conference. These previous 2 years we’ve been resisting them. This evening we have to reveal what we’ve been working on. I believe our chemistry is way much better than previously.”
The conference didn’t precisely work.
Denver managed the Lakers with relative ease in a 127-102 triumph, continuing its supremacy over the Purple and Gold. Consisting of the playoffs, the Nuggets have actually now won 13 of the last 14 conferences.
Those playoff matches have actually been the most challenging for the Lakers, as Nikola Jokić and Co. swept them in the 2023 Western Conference Finals and removed them in 5 video games in the preliminary last season.
It appeared like Los Angeles may turn its fortunes with a six-point halftime lead in Saturday’s video game, however the Nuggets outscored the home group 37-15 in a frustrating efficiency in the 3rd quarter.
The outcome was never ever in doubt in the 4th.
Jokić simply missed out on a triple-double with 34 points, 13 rebounds, 8 helps, 2 takes and one block, while Michael Porter Jr. included 24 points, 11 rebounds and 4 helps. No one from the Lakers scored more than Austin Reaves’ 19, as they just could not stay up to date with the visitors.
They will have another possibility to figure things out versus Denver on Feb. 22.