The Los Angeles Lakers earned themselves another statement win on the road against a very good team when they opened the Western Conference semifinals with a 117-112 victory over the Golden State Warriors on Tuesday.
Anthony Davis led the way with an historically dominant performance, but there is room for improvement and adjustments to be made for both teams.
Now the task for L.A. is to hand Stephen Curry and crew another defeat and put them in a very weak situation before heading home for Game 3 and Game 4. Thursday’s Game 2 will be a virtual must-win contest for Golden State, and one should expect it to come out with a big sense of urgency.
Taking care of these three areas could give the Lakers a commanding 2-0 series lead as they come home for Saturday’s Game 3.
Get out in transition more often
The Lakers won Game 1 despite scoring only 11 fast-break points. They’re most effective when they get out and run, especially since they’re not a great halfcourt offensive team and tend to get into trouble when they slow things down, particularly late in a game.
Off every turnover and defensive rebound, L.A. must make a concerted effort to streak downcourt and get easy layups and dunks before the Warriors can set up their defense. Doing so would also get it easier opportunities in their set offense in the first 10 seconds or so of the shot clock.
LeBron James must shoot the ball efficiently
Despite having three full days off prior to Game 1, James went 9-of-24 from the field in Game 1. He was efficient in the first half, going 5-of-9, but as the game wore on, he started to pile up misses.
James has been more effective offensively when playing off the ball and moving around to get open shots, particularly on cuts to the basket and back-door action. Getting more easy baskets in transition would also help, as he’s still one of the game’s most terrifying players in the open court.
But when he’s handling the ball outside, setting up the offense and milking the shot clock, he has done very poorly. In such situations, he usually settles for contested 3-pointers, and he has made very few of them all season long. The Lakers must limit how often James does so by getting into their offense as early as possible.
Shoot a respectable percentage from 3-point range
Under no circumstances should the Lakers try to beat Golden State as its own game — namely, getting into a 3-point shooting contest. However, they still have to hit at least 35% from downtown in order to win this series.
One has to expect Golden State to double-team Davis at some point and take its chances with D’Angelo Russell, Austin Reaves, Dennis Schroder and James firing up shots from long distance. One could also perhaps expect Warriors head coach Steve Kerr to employ a zone defense more often, something which he tried for a brief spell late in Game 1.
To render both strategies ineffective, L.A. has to make a major improvement on the 24% it shot from beyond the arc on Tuesday.
