It is often said the NBA is a make or miss league, and unfortunately for the Lakers they saw the wrong side of that in their 109 to 90 loss to the Pacers on Friday night. The loss snaps the Lakers five-game winning streak and moves them to two and one halfway through their six-game road trip.
This game took on a totally different feeling than the matchup these teams played earlier in the week, with both teams bringing more determination defensively and neither team showing as much explosiveness in general on offense. This was especially true for the Lakers, whose 90 points was a season low output and was triggered by a 40.7% night shooting from the field, including a five for 30 effort from behind the arc (16.7%).
Part of this is surely attributable to the Lakers playing their third game in four nights while still feeling some of the aftereffects of their double-overtime game to begin the roadie. Many of their missed jumpers were short, and playing a team that races out and runs as much as Indy only impacted any potential fatigue further.
But the Pacers also deserve a huge amount of credit in this one, using a more aggressive, switching style on defense while showing great effort in helping and then recovering to get out to shooters and contest shots and disrupt the flow of the Lakers offense.
Despite a strong defensive night from Indy and some struggles from the outside by the Lakers as a team, they did have some good performances individually.
Anthony Davis came back from missing the team's game in Memphis to lead the Lakers with 24 points and 15 rebounds while gong nine of 17 from the field. Davis was clearly still laboring some with the knee issue that had him miss time, but he settled into the game nicely and had a positive impact on both sides of the ball.
LeBron James and Austin Reaves also played with good spirit and offered up good production with double-doubles. LeBron scored 16 points and grabbed 10 rebounds, hitting six of his 12 shots from the field while looking to attack the rim out of the post and via dribble drives. LeBron also dished out eight assists, really looking for his teammates and trying to set them up for good looks.
Austin, meanwhile, scored 16 points and showed great activity on the backboards with 13 rebounds while also dishing out six assists. Austin never did find his range from behind the arc (one of seven from deep), but was great attacking the paint and finding angles to the rim where he scored well with a variety of finishes with both hands.
Despite these efforts, though, the Pacers simply had too many answers on both sides of the ball while proving fresher and quicker for most of the game. Indy had six different players score in double figures, led by Pascal Siakam's 22 points and Tyrese Haliburton's 21 points. Both did more than score, too, with Siakam added 11 rebounds and six assists, while Haliburton added eight rebounds and eight assists.
And when combining this level of offensive production from the Pacers with their defensive effort -- which included forcing 16 Lakers turnovers -- and the Lakers inability to ever find a rhythm offensively, despite some open looks, Indy just had more than the Lakers could handle in this one.
So now the Lakers will try to regroup and come out ready to bounce back when they travel to Brooklyn to face the Nets on Sunday.