A week after losing to the Sacramento Kings, the Los Angeles Lakers had a chance to redeem themselves when they traveled up north for a pivotal rematch.
With the Western Conference standings so tight, the Lakers needed a win over the Kings to improve their chances to move up and better position themselves for the Play-In Tournament.
Instead, Los Angeles laid another dud against Sacramento and were swept in their regular season series.
Anthony Davis had another poor performance against the Kings and he explained where he and the team fell short, as seen on Spectrum SportsNet:
“We had a 17-point quarter,” Davis said. “We came out in the third and had some turnovers early, they had some guys capitalize on our missed shots. Harrison (Barnes) shot the ball well, they were all really goo from 3. We had a tough shooting night, the turnovers kind of hurt us a bit, offensive rebounding. Anytime they got a rebound, it resulted in a 3 most of the time. It’s tough, you know they’re a good team and when we give them second-chance points or turn the ball over and give them easy points in transition, it just makes it a lot harder.”
Davis also admitted that it’s frustrating to lose twice to Sacramento in similar fashion:
“It’s frustrating, especially the last two games. We had a terrible second quarter at our place and that was the game right there. Tonight, I think it might’ve been the third quarter where we had 17 points. So just came out of halftime and couldn’t put the ball in the basket. Had tough turnovers, especially to start the third. They got some easy looks so to be down four and I think it went to 12, something like that, pretty quickly. So we just got to come out of half ready to go. We all struggled from the field, me, LeBron and DLo, particularly me with shots around the basketball in the first half… When you’re down, you don’t want to give team like this any more extra points… When we give up extra points off of offensive rebounds and turnovers, it’s a lot tougher to beat them.”
Finally, Davis acknowledged that the Lakers beating themselves is the most bothersome way to lose a game:
“Any loss is frustrating, especially when you allow a team to beat you because of your mistakes. Like I said, a lot of turnovers, offensive rebounds, things like that, miscues on defense, communication on defense. We allowed a team to beat us instead of playing the right way and if they made shots and they beat us, hats off to them. But we can’t allow a team to beat us because you don’t know what works. So I think any loss like that is definitely frustrating.”
The Lakers can’t seem to get out of their own way, so Davis and company better come out better prepared when they take on the Golden State Warriors on Saturday.
Anthony Davis on Lakers giving up offensive rebounds
Cleaning up the glass has come back to bite Los Angeles in multiple games this season, and it was a problem in the loss to Sacramento. The Kings grabbed nine offensive rebounds and hurt the Lakers with second-chance points.
Davis explained the long jumpers resulted in more offensive rebounds for Sacramento and said the team can’t afford to stand and watch:
“I’ll have to look at it, but I know one in particular, the last one that Sabonis got and kicked out to Harrison, I boxed him out and I thought Bron was coming over the top to grab the rebound, but he thought I was gonna get it so neither one of us kind of jumped and [Sabonis] got it and kicked it out to Harrison for 3. When they’re shooting a lot of jumpers, it usually results in long rebounds around the free throw line area. We can’t stand and watch, we got to put a body on a body and go get the ball. I’m not sure on all of them, I have to go back and look and kind of see what happened on those.”
The entire roster can do a much better job of bodying up players and boxing out for boards, but it remains to be seen if they’re committed to doing so.
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