Lakers’ worth victory over the Nuggets in the repeat of the Western Conference finals last September, in the Florida bubble, in which the former also defeated the latter. Mike Malone’s pieces failed and, on the contrary, the champion proved to have the machine perfectly oiled after a couple of totally understandable defeats a week ago. The coach, squared in his scheme, did not find solutions to the problems posed by the opponent, more done and with more resources. It didn’t take a heroic version of Anthony Davis, a step up from Marc Gasol or a high 3-point percentage. The leadership of LeBron James and a good collective effort brought Denver down and clearly.
James, who surpassed another Lakers legend like Wilt Chamberlain in volume of pitches scored in the regular season, reached the triple-double (27 + 10 + 10) missing only 7 of his 19 shots and owning a partial of 15-0 with which the party broke in the third quarter. Effort on both sides of the court and a level of leadership that he could not reach, on the other side, Nikola Jokic, more timid than other days, who reached double-digit scoring by the hair and thanks to a couple of actions in the last period.
On the bench and his involvement was a good part of the Lakers victory. In that stretch in which LeBron dominated so much he was accompanied by Kuzma, Harrell y Horton-Tucker, which added 41 points between the three. Media deployment by Frank Vogel. On the other side only Monte Morris was fine. Bad version of Michael Porter. Only these two surpassed twenty minutes of action between the Nuggets backups. Even seeing Dennis Schröder in full swing, and despite the fact that Dozier and Harris are out, the Argentine Facu Campazzo played a whopping two minutes in the game following last Sunday, in which he claimed to ask for more participation.
The bad news for those from Colorado is that they controlled the game well until halftime, it was later when it got out of hand and a lot. They knew how to keep Anthony Davis at bay, who at the beginning of the first and third quarters is a whirlwind and in this battle he came to nothing. LeBron James took control of everything, making his team’s point guard finish more than lead, and punished Nikola Jokic by taking him out of the zone and speeding away on several occasions. However, the strategy from the second period did not work, where Morris took the rhythm of the game to his ground in the minutes in which Murray was not to upset the head of his rivals. At halftime, the difference was fourteen points in favor of the Nuggets, not knowing what would come next.
LeBron James beat everyone who got ahead in the second half. Be it Jokic, Millsap or Green, none stopped him. Stellar performance despite the fact that he also dedicated himself to making his teammates play and the numbers were good and not extraordinary. The feeling of dominance was. And on both sides of the court. The Nuggets, who had their two guards in a good tone, totally cut off their rhythm. To highlight, again, what was also added by Montrezl Harrell, a regular in the second unit, or a Talen Horton-Tucker who responds better every day.
The Lakers took off with that set to close the third period and in the fourth and everything was uphill for the Nuggets. They even ended up raising the white flag despite being far ahead in the first half. Jokic tried to get them to play for him, he was seen to assume that responsibility, but it was simply not the day and in front of him a bullfighter with many tasks behind him entered to kill.