The Lakers led the Nuggets by 20 points and were beaten by Murray to lose their second road 99-101. Compared with the 76ers' five-point lead in the last 30 seconds and being reversed, the Lakers did their best.
There are two most important messages from this game: first, the Lakers can still play very high-quality basketball, even leading the championship team by 20 points, and second, they can only last less than three quarters with such high-quality basketball because of the lack of fitness of the core players.
James is old and has to carefully choose the time period to exert his strength, Davis's high-quality play can last for three quarters, but in the face of Jokic himself, he has to play 39 minutes, and he doesn't even have the strength to push Jokic out in the last eight or nine minutes.
The numbers speak for themselves:
First, the Lakers scored 59 points in the first two quarters, but only scored 20 points in each of the last two quarters, adding up to only 40 points;
Second, Davis scored 24 points in the first half, shooting 11-of-12, only two free throws, none of which were three-pointers, and grabbed 6 rebounds, scoring 32 points on 14-of-18 shooting in the first three quarters, and only made 4 free throws, but only shot once in the final quarter, no free throws, and no score; Russell scored 18 points in the first half, 6-of-7 three-pointers, but only 1-of-4 three-pointers in the second half, scoring 5 points;
Third, James chose to take the lead and save his fitness for last, so he only scored 14 points in the first three quarters, but scored 12 points on 5-of-9 shooting in the final quarter without a single assist.
From the change of rotation order, it can also be seen that James arranged his physical fitness: in the first game, he and Davis reversed the order of the regular season, James played the first quarter, and Davis began to attack the opponent's relatively weak rotation lineup with the rotation group in the second quarter, but in the second game, he and Davis changed back to the rest order of the regular season, and Davis played the first quarter again, and James began to lead the rotation group in the second quarter.
The most important purpose of this is to keep James from playing the whole quarter, not to play too long at the beginning, so as not to lose his physical strength later, and at the same time, the first two quarters allowed Davis to saturate Jokic, and most of the opportunities were given to him, and Davis also played the best first half of his career.
After such careful arrangement, James was very efficient in the fourth quarter, and when it was time to be caught up, it was his two three-pointers that allowed the Lakers to regain a slight advantage, and he even had a steal and a high-speed counterattack split. In the end, almost every time the Lakers attacked, James broke through with the ball, and if he was allowed to play the first quarter, it would be impossible to have such physical strength in the fourth quarter.
But despite this, there are two scenes that show that his physical performance in the last 5 minutes is a red light: the first appeared in the last 4 minutes and 46 seconds, James broke through and was blocked, fell to the ground from the air, and lay on the ground helplessly watching everyone grab the ball in the middle line, resulting in a 24-second violation by the Lakers, and the second was at 4 minutes and 14 seconds, when the Lakers were chased to 4 points left, James called a timeout for himself - this was the last time James recharged in this game.
All this shows that after the defeat of G1 in the second half, the Lakers deeply recognized their physical problems, adjusted the rotation and tactical order, tried to let Davis establish an advantage in the first half, and let James finish in the last 5 minutes.
If it weren't for Murray's last two accurate shots, the Lakers would have almost achieved their goal.
Defensively, the Lakers also made adjustments to Murray and Jokic, their wheel-based defense of Murray allowed him to score only 6 points in the first three quarters, but when the final pace slowed down, Murray exploded in the final quarter and scored 14 points, and Jokic scored 15+8+8 in the second half.
There are two defensive adjustments to Jokic, one is for Davis to take the lead instead of Hachimura, and the other is to pinch when Jokic enters the sides of the basket and not pinch when he is facing the basket. Jokic had a tough first three quarters because his good passing angle was gone, so he only had six assists in the first three quarters, and if the fourth quarter had fewer than two assists, it would have been a very successful containment.
However, James and Davis couldn't afford it, but Jokic had plenty of fat to provide him with a steady stream of energy, and he was able to play 41 minutes, 22 of which were in the second half. In the first half, it was Davis who beat Jokic, and in the second half, it was Jokic who beat Davis. Jokic also had four assists in the fourth quarter to put himself in a triple-double and 20 rebounds.
fell short and was killed, and now the Lakers are in an embarrassing situation:
First of all, the starting five had enough strength to fight the Nuggets, but they could only hold on for 3 quarters;
Second, role players, especially bench players, whose main task is defense, contribute too little offensively. Dinwiddie and Vincent combined for only three shots, neither of whom scored, and only Prince scored six points, while the Nuggets bench was originally a weak ring and had little offensive ability, but they relied on Braun's 10 points and scored twice as many points off the bench as the Lakers.
Third, given the starting fitness issues and bench offensive deficiencies, the Lakers' most realistic goal is not to be swept again, because fitness problems don't go away just because they're on the home court.
The best chance to win at home is to hope for a big lead over the opponent, as G2 did today. However, a 20-point lead over the championship team is hard to come by at home or away, because you can't guarantee that Davis will be able to go 11-of-12 from the field like he did in the first half today.
The only good news is that Davis, after today's fight, at least knows that he plays Jokic, and the hook hand is quite effective.
As the series deepens, the room for adjustment between the two sides is getting smaller and smaller, and how to stimulate the offensive vitality of role players has become the most important task for G3.