Los Angeles– The stars are shining brightly in Los Angeles. on that legendary night Lakers head coach Pat Riley gets his statue outside Crypto.com Arenathe arena was packed with basketball’s elite: Magic Johnson, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Dwyane Wade and James Worthy (not to mention NBC’s Carmelo Anthony, Tracy McGrady, Vince Carter and Reggie Miller).
There are plenty of stars on the court, too: LeBron James, Luka Doncic and Jaylen Brown all played in last weekend’s All-Star Game.
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However, the Celtics’ role players held Boston to a comfortable 111-89 win, especially Payton Pritchard, who came off the bench to score 30 points and was outstanding late in the game.
“I think we have a lot of underrated players that people don’t know are that good and are ready for that moment,” Pritchard said of the performance off the bench. “So I think they just saw that.”
boston defense
Where Boston’s depth really started to show was on defense – Baylor Sherman started for the Celtics and Hugo Gonzalez came off the bench, both of whom were ball hawks all night, putting pressure on Luka Doncic, LeBron James and Austin Reeves to really struggle to score. Boston wanted to pressure the ball and then run out and wear down the Lakers. This worked because the Lakers shot less than 40 percent overall.
What really stood out — and was a key difference in this game — was Boston’s game plan discipline. The Celtics’ defense put pressure on LeBron (20 points on 21 true shooting attempts) and Doncic (25 points on 25 true shooting attempts), but also dared the Lakers’ role players, who often had good looks, to beat them. The non-Slovenian-born Laker shot 21.7 percent (5 of 23) from 3-point range.
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“I mean, sometimes you just gotta shoot,” LeBron said. “When we didn’t have a shot, they made a timely shot. We didn’t give ourselves a good chance on the offensive end. Defensively, we held on as hard as we could, but on the offensive end, we didn’t give ourselves a good chance.”
A lack of shooting has been an issue for the Lakers all season, which is why they traded Luke Kennard (nine points on Sunday and just two 3-pointers in 22 minutes) before the deadline. Boston’s pressure defense was the focal point of the night, exacerbating Los Angeles’ shooting woes.
“Offensively, we’re starting to find our footing, but defensively, we have to make sure we keep the same mentality. We saw that tonight. Hugo made some big plays for us. Baylor was great tonight.”
The score was mostly close in the first half, but Boston created some space late in the second quarter as it generated better looks and made better shots. Although Doncic scored 18 points, Boston still led 60-50 at halftime.
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The depth issues didn’t really start to catch up with Los Angeles until the second half, as they had their chances but couldn’t close the gap on Boston. Pritchard outscored the Lakers’ bench on his own that night, and by the end of the night he was draining a 3-pointer and yelling at NBC’s Reggie Miller as he ran back down the court.
Then there’s Jaylen Brown. Boston’s All-Star and MVP candidate led all scorers with 32 points, and he was the aggressor all night, getting downhill and drawing fouls in the paint (9-for-12 from the free throw line).
Lakers head coach J.J. Redick thinks his team is good enough defensively to compete, but 89 points isn’t enough to win in the NBA, especially against the top two teams in the Eastern Conference like Boston.
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Boston’s Derrick White had 12 points and 8 assists, and Nemeans Queta had 10 points and 12 rebounds. Austin Reeves added 15 points for the Lakers.
“We did enough on defense, but our offense was terrible tonight,” Redick said.
The Lakers’ stars can help in that regard, but Redick will need more help from his role players if the Lakers are to be any threat in the West.
