The high of the Los Angeles Lakers winning the NBA’s inaugural In-Season Tournament came crashing down when they lost two out of three on their Texas road trip.
Their most recent loss was an extremely disappointing one as the Lakers helped the San Antonio Spurs snap their 18-game losing streak. The Spurs jumped out to an early advantage and led by as many as 25 points early in the second
quarter. While the Lakers came storming back, they were never able to get over the hump and wound up suffering the loss to drop to 15-11 on the season.
L.A. was without three starters in the loss as Anthony Davis, D’Angelo Russell and Cam Reddish were all dealing with minor injuries. With that being the case, Lakers head coach Darvin Ham was pleased with how his team fought despite the loss, via Spectrum SportsNet:
“I just told them that no one ever wants to get comfortable with losing. That said, I’m super duper proud of them. They got up by a lot early, we fought our way back into it but just couldn’t get over the hump. But just the competitive spirit, particularly in the second and third quarters. It was tough. You don’t have three of your starters, it’s tough. Guys are being slotted in places they’re normally not slotted. But no one feels sorry for you. You just got to keep digging away and try to get healthy as soon as possible.”
The Lakers’ schedule in December has not been kind as they have been traveling a lot, including to Las Vegas for the In-Season Tournament where they played an extra game that didn’t count toward the regular season standings.
When asked if the In-Season Tournament caught up with the Lakers on their Texas road trip, Ham acknowledged the challenges they’ve faced although wasn’t willing to use it as an excuse:
“It was a high-intensity situation and then a lot of travel involved going back to L.A. from Vegas, and then jumping on a plane from L.A. to Dallas on Monday and then coming out here. And the weather, different climates, different weather. You can use any and every excuse in the book. But the thing is, you can’t control health. That just kind of happens. So I’m proud of our guys for stepping up and playing the way that they did to secure the In-Season Tournament. But this is a marathon of a season so as soon as we can get healthy, the better.”
Getting healthy is extremely important for the Lakers as they have shown that they can compete with anyone when all of their key players are in the lineup.
LeBron James acknowledged this after Friday’s loss to the Spurs as well, so hopefully the Lakers can get guys back as soon as Monday night when they host the New York Knicks.
Darvin Ham provides updates on Anthony Davis & Lakers
The good news is that Ham provided updates on guys like Davis, Russell, Reddish and Gabe Vincent after the game on Friday night and sounded optimistic that none of them will miss much more time, if any at all.
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