Just What the Lakers Needed

No turmoil. No trade talk. No in-fighting. For one night, all was good in LakerLand. Better than good, Friday night was a glimpse of everything the 2007-08 Los Angeles Lakers are capable of. Coming off a disappointing home loss to the Houston Rockets in their season opener, the Lakers walked into the US Airways Arena and proceeded to completely humiliate the heavily favored Phoenix Suns in their home opener, hammering them by a score of 119-98 (and trust me, it wasn’t even that close!). After falling behind 8-2 to start the game, the Lakers outscored the Suns 31-12 in the lasy nin minutes of the opening quarter and never really looked back, leading by as many as 33 points in the fourth quarter.

How exactly did the Lakers succeed in dropping the hammer on the Suns? Rebounding and an unselfishness and balanced attack. Sure, they were on fire from the perimeter, making 22 of 42 attempts (52.4%; 56.5% overall) from 15 feet and beyond, including 8 of 13 3-pointers (61.5%), but the Lakers aggressive rebounding and offensive execution are what did the Suns in.

In disposing of the Suns, the Lakers only required 28 minutes and 16 points from Kobe Bryant, though he did play a huge part in the win adding 11 rebounds (3 offensive), a team-high 4 assists and 3 steals. Vladimir Radmanovic, yes THAT Vladimir Radmanovic was the team’s top scorer Friday, leading five Lakers in double figures with 19 points on just eight shot attempts (he made all four of his 3-pointers and all three of his free throws). In addition to Kobe and Radmanovic, Derek Fisher (14 points, 7-9 FG), Andrew Bynum (14 points; more on him in a second) and Sasha Vujacic (12 points, 2-3 3-pt, 4-4 FT) cracked double figures for the Lakers. All in all, this was a decidedly “un-Laker-like” offensive performance.

The other area where the Lakers dominated the Suns on Friday was on the boards, outrebounding Phoenix 54-34 (11-9 on the offensive glass) and holding Amare Stoudemire to a single rebound. Despite the strong rebounding efforts of Kobe and Kwame Brown (9 rebounds; 3 offensive), the Lakers were led on the boards by the man whose performance perfectly summed up the team performance- Andrew Bynum. The Lakers’ 20 year-old center came off the bench on Friday and in just 23 minutes, scored 14 points, making seven of his ten field goal attempts, grabbed a team-high 13 rebounds and handed out 3 assists. Man, it looks like this kid can really play!

As for the Suns, it looks like there could be some cause for serious concern. Their shortcomings against the Lakers are the issues that could plague this team throughout the season. Although his ineffectiveness on Friday was a rarity, Amare Stoudemire still seems unable to avoid foul trouble, and the Suns have only Brian Skinner and Sean Marks to back him up in the paint. Steve Nash also had a tough game against the Lakers, turning the ball over five times while handing out just three assists, which wound up hurting Shawn Marion, Grant Hill and Raja Bell, who combined for just 31 points on the night. That the Suns were not able to replace Nash’s production with back-up point guard Marcus Banks, who was just 1-of-6 shooting in 15 minutes (although he did have four assists), is also problematic as Nash’s minutes will need to managed in order to reduce the risk of injury on his chronically sore back and to keep him fresh for the NBA’s stretch run and the post-season.

To be clear, this is unlikely to become the standard performance from the Los Angeles Lakers this season, but it is a resounding example of this team’s potential. The Lakers turned in a dominating performance against a top-tier contender, albeit one on the back end of a back-to-back, by getting several members of the team rolling on offense early in the game, and by crashing the boards aggressively and not allowing the Suns’ fast break to get rolling. Was this performance a fluke, or will it have a lasting impact on the Lakers and catapult them to a strong start to the season? We don’t have to wait long to find out. Sunday night, the Lakers will host another Western Conference contender, the Utah Jazz, at Staples Center, as they will be returning home to face another challenging Western Conference matchup.

Second Attempt At A First Win

November 2, 2007, 10:30 PM Eastern (7:30 PM Pacific)

U S Airways Center- Phoenix, AZ

In Tuesday’s season opener, a miraculous comeback almost resulted in an upset win for the Lakers’ the Houston Rockets, but came up just a bit short.

Tonight, at the US Airways Center in Phoenix, the Los Angeles Lakers will face off with the Phoenix suns in their home opener. Phoenix kicked off its season last night in Seattle. Despite being heavily favored heading into the game, the Suns’ 106-99 victory against Kevin Durant and the Supersonics was anything but easy, with Phoenix trailing for much of the game, including facing a 3 point deficit entering the fourth quarter.

Lakers’ Notes

With the Kobe Bryant trade talks dying down (at least for the moment), the Lakers can finally focus on basketball. With Lamar Odom still nursing an injured should, as well as a slight concussion suffered in a car accident on Tuesday, Phil Jackson’s starting lineup should resemble the unit that took the floor against the Rockets- Kobe and Derek Fisher in the backcourt, Luke Walton and Ronnie Turiaf at forward and (hopefully) Andrew Bynum in middle (although it will likely be Kwame Brown once again).

In order to have success on offense, the Lakers will need to look to the gameplan that allowed them to have success against the Suns in the 2005 Playoffs- try to control the tempo with their halfcourt offense, keep feeding the post, and only look to run when the opportunity clearly presents itself. Another aim of this strategy will be to attack Amare Stoudemire, who was very foul-prone early in Thursday night’s game in Seattle, much like he was last spring in the Suns’ playoff series against the Spurs. Until he shows the ability to avoid early foul trouble, this will be an area opposing teams should look to exploit against the Suns. The low post attack should not be confined to only Amre Stoudemire. The Lakers need to use Kobe, Fisher and Luke Walton to make the other members of the Suns, particularly Steve Nash, Leandro Barbosa ad Grant Hill, play defense on the low block. In addition to the fact that not one of these guys is a defensive stopper (Nash is actually a liability), they are probably a little tired. This is the second game of a back-to-back- and the first ended after 10:30 PM (Pacific Time) last night and took place 1,500 miles away.

Suns’ Notes

The Phoenix Suns did not look sharp for the first three quarters of their season opener. They did succeed in putting it all together in the final quarter against Seattle to come away with the 9-point win, but they clearly did not storm out of the gates. Granted, their style of play is such that as long as one guy is hot from the outside at a given time, they can hang some huge numbers on the scoreboard. On the injury front, both Leandro Barbosa is suffering from sore ribs and both Boris Diaw and Raja Bell are nursing sore ankles, but all three played at least 25 minutes last night without showing any ill-effects. Don’t look for the Suns to change anything in their gameplan. Regardless of the opponent, Nash & Co. will look to do what they always do- run early and often and move the ball until someone has a clean look from the outside. When that gets old, they’ll run some more, this time looking for Barbosa, Hill or Shawn Marion on the wings. The only way to stop them is to get back early on defense, find a man and guard him (even if it’s not “your man”) and keep your long-range misses to a minimum.

Look for the Suns to start Nash and Raja Bell in the backcourt, with Marion, Grant Hill and Stoudemire up front.

What should we be looking for tonight?

This is exactly the kind of game in which the Lakers have pulled many an upset before- they look out of sync, no one is really paying any attention to them on the court, Kobe is mad and the Suns took a late flight home following a hard-fought game last night. Expect another close one tonight. Also expect another big game from Kobe tonight- he’s just in one of “those” stretches where he looks like he’s shooting for 40 every night. Whether the Lakers are able to pull it out will depend on two things- their discipline in sticking with the half court game and their commitment to getting back early against the Suns’ break.