Expectations were not that high for the Los Angeles Lakers going into this season, as they have one of the youngest rosters in the NBA.
The main goal for Los Angeles is to continue to develop their young core to make L.A. a possible landing spot for free agents next summer when the Lakers could sign two max free agents.
So far the Lakers have played better than expected, as their record sits at 3-4 and their defense is miles ahead of where it was projected to be.
The Lakers are coming off their best game of the season, a 113-93 wire-to-wire win over the Detroit Pistons. In a recent interview with Trevor Lane on the Lakers Nation Podcast, Lakers power forward Larry Nance Jr. said that after seeing how they played against the Pistons, he believes the Lakers can play with any team in the league:
“I think we can be pretty good. Last game (against the Detroit Pistons) we played great and I don’t know if there were too many teams who could have beat us with the way we played last game. If we can start stringing games together like that more frequently we’re going to be a problem for not just some teams, but all of them.”
Nance Jr., who earned the starting power forward job in training camp, is off to his best start in his three-year career. It has only been seven games, but he is currently averaging career-highs in points (11.1), rebounds (7.9), steals (1.6) and field goal percentage (60.4). In addition to his team goals, he set a personal goal of making First-Team All-Defense.
Win total isn’t necessarily the most important thing for the Lakers this season, but with no first round draft pick, there is no longer an incentive to lose games like there was the last couple seasons.
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