The Los Angeles Lakers missed a huge opportunity to head into the All-Star break with their heads held high after a 117-113 loss on the road to the Atlanta Hawks. The purple and gold have now lost two in a row, four out of their last five and seven of their last 10 games, as team leaders LeBron James and Rajon Rondo are grasping for answers.
“This is a tough loss for us,” James said after the game, according to ESPN's Dave McMenamin. “We didn't have consistent play from all facets of the game. Offensively and defensively, we jacked up a lot of coverages to start the game. In the third quarter we jacked up a lot of our coverages again. It was always playing uphill, like we've been doing of late. We've got to be a lot better.”
The Lakers, who had picked up their defense to jump into a top-10 team in the less-lauded art of basketball, have reverted to their old ways, and getting James back after a month-long absence from a groin injury hasn't helped them much.
Rondo has seen the trend through a recent stretch, one he knows will need to be fixed if Los Angeles hopes to make the playoffs in a crowded West.
“We've given up a lot of points the last however many games — eight to 10 games — and it's just been a shootout, and we haven't won many of the shootouts,” Rondo said. “So we've got to find a way to get a different dynamic as far as defensively to get stops.”
The Lakers only have 25 games left and have the ninth-toughest remaining schedule, according to Tankathon — still with two games remaining against the Milwaukee Bucks, as well as a season-series capper against the Golden State Warriors, Toronto Raptors, Denver Nuggets, and the Oklahoma City Thunder in their post-All-Star break future.
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