Four months will have gone by before basketballs start bouncing in Orlando, Florida at Walt Disney World in late July. The NBA season's hiatus will officially come to an end with the Los Angeles Lakers being one of the teams gearing up for a potential run at a title.
Only 22 teams are invited to what will be the final stretch of the 2019-20 campaign on the East Coast. Eight regular-season games will be played ahead of the 2020 NBA Playoffs to secure the seeding for the postseason. The Lakers are currently sitting atop the Western Conference standings and will be looking forward to seeing who they'll be facing in the first round as there are only a few options.
Among the limited options to secure the eighth and final playoff spot in the West, there are three in particular that the Lakers should be hoping for in terms of the least amount of resistance to advance to the second round.
3. New Orleans Pelicans
Of all the potential first-round matchups for the Lakers, LeBron James and company taking on Zion Williamson's New Orleans Pelicans is perhaps the most intriguing. It would be storylines galore! These two teams have been connected for all the wrong reasons ever since the vetoed Chris Paul trade when they used to be the New Orleans Hornets.
Last summer, after seemingly endless speculation and trade rumors, which played a part in the Lakers' derailed season during the 2018-19 campaign, a blockbuster deal was made between these two teams involving a lot of big names on both sides. Anthony Davis was the prize the Lakers were looking for to pair with LeBron, and there were able to do just that, but they gave some up-and-coming young players in Lonzo Ball, Brandon Ingram, and Josh Hart.
This deal, which turned out to be a foregone conclusion, rocked the NBA and created some bad blood. The three players sent to New Orleans weren't thrilled about continually being mentioned in trade rumors for an entire season and will be out for vengeance while playing alongside Williamson, who has only gotten better and better with every minute on the basketball floor.
However, this matchup would still likely only go five games at best. Ingram and Zion could become one of the best duos in the NBA with Ball possibly coming into his own as well, but they are still a few years away, which would set up an easy first-round showdown for Los Angeles.
2. Dallas Mavericks
Luka Doncic is a bona fide superstar. The international import has taken the NBA by storm in a very short time and will be able to show what he can do during the playoffs this summer while leading a Dallas Mavericks squad on the rise.
Although Doncic is a potential future MVP with NBA titles potentially on the horizon, he is not ready to win big now, and neither is the team around him. Dallas may have taken a step forward with the acquisition of another international star in Kristaps Porzingis. Still, these two rising stars need more time to mesh while also needing more talent around them to truly contend with the best of the best in the NBA.
With that being said, the Lakers can take advantage of this young and inexperienced team in the first round. Basically, they can focus solely on containing Doncic and force Porizingis to beat them, and this could end up being a sweep. Dallas was able to crush the Lakers earlier in the season, but this Los Angeles team is now locked in, or at least they were before the hiatus, and this could be a quick series.
1. Memphis Grizzlies
The most likely opponent for the Lakers in the first round is the Memphis Grizzlies. Not only are they the odds-on favorite to go head-to-head with LeBron's squad, but they are the team Los Angeles should hope for because the sheer inexperience of this squad.
The future is very bright for guard Ja Morant. The Murray State product has quickly become one of the better guards in this league while getting some flattering comparisons to Hall of Famer Allen Iverson. Although Morant is bound to make some highlight reels during the playoffs and get even more people convinced he could be a perennial All-Star, the fact of the matter is that he really doesn't have the talent around him to compete right now, especially against a stacked Lakers squad led by two of the league's elite players.
Morant would cause problems for Los Angeles. There's no doubt about that. Avery Bradley and Rajon Rondo would have their hands full trying to contain the rising star, but in the end, he can't do it all by himself. He would eventually fall to a veteran team with title aspirations.
Needless to say, the Lakers have an easy path ahead of them in the first round. It could potentially be entertaining with Zion, Luka, or Ja trying to hold their own against Los Angeles, but Frank Vogel's team will make easy work out of any team or star that stands in their way once the postseason gets started.
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