Even with Davis, Lakers can’t complete comeback in loss to Wizards
Anthony Davis sat on the Lakers’ bench for a few seconds after they had lost to the Washington Wizards, his head down and his hands crossed.
When the Lakers forward eventually got up, the sting of a 116-107 defeat resonated with Davis as he walked back to the locker room at Washington’s Capital One Arena.
It was his fourth game back after missing 30 with a strained right calf, and it was his best game on the four-game trip.
But Davis’ 26 points weren’t enough to prevent a defeat that gave the Lakers a 1-3 record on the trip.
Davis’ 10-for-20 shooting, two-for-five on three-pointers, five rebounds, three steals and one blocked shot couldn’t stop the Lakers from dropping their fifth game in seven outings.
“Just that we let it get away,” Davis said about his thoughts after the game. “I think our second quarter kind of just killed us. We didn’t play with any pace. Our defense was pretty poor and then coming out in the third quarter, kind of the same thing. I think our effort wasn’t there in the third quarter as well.”
In the Lakers’ win at Orlando on Monday, Montrezl Harrell unleashed all the energy he had stored up from not playing in Saturday’s loss at Dallas.
The Lakers couldn’t slow down Washington’s dangerous backcourt of Russell Westbrook and Bradley Beal, who combined for 45 points.
Westbrook notched 18 points, 18 rebounds and 14 assists, and Beal had 27 points.
And now the fifth-seeded Lakers (36-26) have only a 11/2-game lead over the sixth-seeded Dallas Mavericks in the Western Conference.
“The other team is playing in a desperate situation,” Davis said. “We control our own destiny. So, we have to start playing with a sense of desperation. Even though we are the playoffs as of right now, we’re not that far off from being in a play-in game. So, we got to play with a sense of desperation.”
The Lakers fell into a 16-point hole in the third quarter, their offense in another drought and their defense almost nonexistent.
And it got only worse for the Lakers in the fourth, their defense so poor that they let Westbrook throw a length-of-the-court pass to a wide-open Ish Smith for a two-handed dunk that gave the Wizards a 98-79 lead.
“We just allowed them to get in a rhythm,” Andre Drummond said after scoring 17 points and grabbing 11 rebounds. “That’s all it was. They’ve been playing well, won the last eight out of nine, so they got a really good rhythm going. We didn’t do a good job of turning the water off.”
The Lakers called a timeout with nine minutes 11 seconds left, hoping that would stop them from reeling.
But they got down by 19 points in the early in the fourth quarter before making a run that got them as close as nine points.
Dennis Schroder says LeBron James is close to coming back from an ankle injury, but the exact timeline for the Lakers star’s return remains an unknown.
Davis was moved to the center spot in the fourth, which allowed the Lakers to make a move.
He had 14 points on five-for-eight shooting and two for four on three-pointers in the final quarter.
It was a new look Lakers coach Frank Vogel wanted to try to get Davis back in some sort of rhythm.
“I think it helped,” Vogel said. “He’s obviously in this phase of trying to get his legs back under him, obviously trying to get his timing.
“We got down 19 at that point [and] you try to make something happen and I think there was two benefits there — one to try to get AD some easier looks to continue to get him in rhythm. You get down 19, you try to change the game, which is what we were looking for. And we were able to make some mini-runs, but they hit some big shots down the stretch to hold on.”
Three observations on the Lakers
- When LeBron James will return to play was the main question Lakers coach Frank Vogel was asked before the game against the Wizards. Vogel’s answer stayed the same, that James is out indefinitely. “He and the medical team will tell me when he’s ready,” Vogel said. “They’re having conversations about it each day.”
- Montrezl Harrell (12 points on five-for-five shooting) had another efficient night as the backup center behind Andre Drummond.
- The Lakers couldn’t make their three-pointers. They shot 29.4% from distance, going 10 for 34, compared with the Wizards’ six for 18.
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