It’s early — the Lakers will rebound after loss in playoff series opener against Suns
Is it appropriate to note here that the Lakers lost Game 1 in their first two series in the bubble last year en route to championship No. 17?
If so, it’s also appropriate to note this: Toto, they’re not in Orlando any more.
Oh, and for those experts who figured the No. 7 seed should be favored over the No. 2 seed, just because of LeBron James and Anthony Davis? The Phoenix Suns, backed by a rollicking home crowd that is as close to a pre-pandemic environment as we’ve yet seen, had answers for that, too.
The final Sunday afternoon was 99-90 Phoenix, and it didn’t seem that close for most of the afternoon. The Suns had more energy, more physicality and more urgency. That stands to reason since it was the franchise’s first playoff game since 2010, when the Lakers swept them en
route to their 16th championship.
These Lakers, maybe trying to ease into this series against a team they’d smacked around by 13 two weeks ago at home, seemed taken aback by the way the 51-win Suns took the initiative. Not even the scrap early in Sunday’s fourth-quarter between Alex Caruso and Phoenix’s Cameron Payne, which brought the sight of Montrezl Harrell as aggressive peacemaker, lit any sort of spark for the defending champs. They trailed by nine when Payne bodychecked Caruso and got a shove in return, got as close as seven points with 6-½ minutes to play, but came no closer.
Davis has to be better, for one, though he was likely taking one for the team in the aftermath when he said, “This is on me.” He was far from the only one missing shots, on a day the Lakers shot 26.9 percent from beyond the three-point line and made just 2 of 10 from there in the second half.
Davis was 5 for 16 from the field for 13 points and it was apparent that his 42-point night in the
teams’ last regular-season meeting got the Suns’ attention. “They did a good job limiting his touches, and bringing the doubleteam when he did get it,” coach Frank Vogel said.
Davis said he wasn’t as assertive offensively as he normally is or should be: “Usually I come out of the gates very dominating ... I kind of just got lost in the offense.”
One response to that: “It’s never one guy,” James said. “I love when AD puts that pressure on himself. We’re a better team when he’s aggressive. We’re a better team when he demands the ball, and we all gotta do better as well.”
The assumption, from the smart guys in the desert and the others who installed the Lakers as the favorites in this series, was that the true Lakers were the ones who were 21-6 before Davis got hurt Feb. 16. Problem is, that was 14 weeks ago. You can predict that these Lakers will recapture that magic, but you can’t assume it.
The Suns had a compromised Chris Paul for most of the day, after he’d suffered a shoulder contusion in an inadvertent collision with teammate Cam Johnson early in the second quarter. Paul came back, left for the locker room in
the third quarter, then returned later in the period. He was short on his shots and seemed to have difficulty handling the ball when he went to his right, but maybe just being out there proved enough of a point.
“He played the way Chris plays, with the heart of a warrior,” Suns coach Monty Williams told ESPN’s Rachel Nichols during an in-game conversation.
Anyway, CP3 had plenty of help. Devin Booker, one of three Suns starters playing in his firstever playoff game, certainly didn’t let the moment intimidate him, with 34 points and eight assists. Deandre Ayton, similarly making his playoff debut, grabbed 16 rebounds all-told to go with his 21 points, and this was the most telling stat of the day: Eight of those came at the offensive end. You fail to box out that often, you probably deserve to lose.
Beyond that, it’s hard to be too critical of the Lakers’ defensive play. The Suns averaged 115.3 points a game during the regular season and shot 49 percent from the field and 37.8 percent from beyond the arc. Sunday they were 9 of 28 on 3-pointers (32.1 percent) and reached 46.5
percent overall mainly because of Booker’s 13-for26, including 3-of-7 on 3-pointers, and Ayton’s 10-for-11, the longest shot from one (1) foot away according to the official playby-play.
The issue wasn’t stopping the Suns. The issue was scoring.
“I think the majority of shots that we took tonight I think are shots we want to take,” Caruso said. “We’ve just got to make a couple more. And some of that might be just us being a little more aggressive.”
If history is a guide, they should iron that out with a day to think about it. For those with short memories, the Lakers lost their playoff opener last year to Portland 100-93 and went on to win the next four. They lost the opener in their next series to Houston, won the next four and didn’t trail in a series the rest of the way.
But keep in mind we’re also talking about a different group, playing in different conditions. And if Sunday’s non-socially-distanced crowd of 11,824 was any indication, the Lakers will have to win at least one game in this series amid the raucous soundtrack of “Beat L.A.”
Admit it, Laker fans: It’s good to have that playoff tradition back too.