Locked On Lakers - Daily Podcast On The Los Angeles Lakers - Lakers Beat Warriors 118-108. Davis Dominates, Vanderbilt Returns!

Starting point is 00:00:00 Hey, everyone, welcome to a special bonus episode of Locked on Lakers for a Sunday. Brian Komenetsky, Andy Kaminetsky, the Lakers win their third straight, 118, as Anthony Davis dominates the Golden State Warriors. Good start to the road trip. That's next. You are Locked on Lakers. Your daily Los Angeles Lakers podcast, part of the Locked on podcast network, your team every day. Thanks to everybody for making Locked on Lakers. First listen to every day Monday through Friday, sometimes on Sunday. no matter how we get your podcast. This one's always free.

Starting point is 00:00:39 Never behind a paywall. Locked on Lakers on YouTube, Andy's where over 27,000 subscribers are enjoying the rest of their weekend. Thanks to what the Lakers did in San Francisco on Saturday night, 118, the final score of game. Really, the Lakers, after maybe what, midway through the first quarter, really controlled, I think, pretty effectively. I felt like they were sort of the better team. I mean, they finished the half. up just one point. It was 59, 58 at the half. I'm not saying that I was concerned the Lakers were going to lose the game. I mean, certainly after just one half, but I would say it's an overstatement

Starting point is 00:01:19 that the Lakers controlled it from the first quarter on. I do think from the maybe halfway through the third quarter on, they absolutely controlled it. And the more the second half went along, the more and more tight the control the Lakers had over the game became. Yeah, I just felt like, you know, as the game started to move and you could see sort of how the game was going to be played, I just felt like the Lakers were the team. You know, you watch a game sometimes. You're like, I don't understand how this, you know,

Starting point is 00:01:49 one team's winning, one team isn't. Like, if you're just watching without a score, one team looks like they're playing better and is the better team. I felt like the Lakers were that team. as sort of the game went along, certainly in the second hand. Well, actually, since you mentioned this, actually, a really good tweet from at Run the Jules, big Lakers fan on Lakers Twitter,

Starting point is 00:02:11 because he was responding to someone who said this, like you were saying, Brian, it doesn't feel like this should be a close game right now. Golden State Warriors have a plus 19 edge from threes, points off turnovers, and second chance points. L.A. is letting them hang around by losing on the margins. In the second half, they said no more margins, kids.

Starting point is 00:02:29 and that was basically it. Well, one thing I think we can all agree on, Anthony Davis dominated this game, 36 points, 13 rebounds, blocking shots all over the place. You know, he was just, you know, a block, I mean, I'm sorry, contesting shots all over the place, one block, but just, you know, the Golden State is not set up to really handle AD,

Starting point is 00:02:52 I think, in any meaningful way. Particularly without Graham on Green. Yeah. Yeah. To me, this is what you need. On a night where there isn't a reasonable defense for AD with the other teams, like go out there and dominate them as exactly what he did. It is a shame that Golden State is not likely good enough to at minimum avoid the play-in,

Starting point is 00:03:17 if not miss the playoffs altogether because they are such a good playoff matchup for the Lakers. I would love for them to somehow get into the bracket where the Lakers can take them because just time and time again we've seen over the last few years, they just, the Lakers have way too much size and physicality for them, you know, for all the talk, especially lately, and I'm sure we'll get into it about AD openly wanting a center, wanting more size on this team. They're still not a small team,

Starting point is 00:03:51 especially once you bring back and we'll talk about it, Jared Vanderbilt, who finally made his return after nearly, a year away from the court. Yeah, and Vando, you could see the, I mean, Russ aside, you know, he's going to be on a minute's limit and all these other things, but you can just see what it does to put him back into the rotation in terms of adding athleticism, adding, you know, an ability, a skill set that they didn't have defensively. So we'll focus on that in a minute, but, you know, I always, I, we look at this every game.

Starting point is 00:04:25 Like, what is the contribution from, some people don't like calling Reeves part of a big three, but the Lakers are constructed like he is. And so, you know, when- JJ Reddick referred to LeBron, A.D. and Reeves, not necessarily by name, but in a way that was fully obvious who he was talking about as the Lakers' three best players and said that the Lakers three best players over the last two games have all played very well. and then everyone around them has been stars in their role. So to the point we've both made,

Starting point is 00:04:58 this is how the Lakers constructed the roster. That's the big three they imagined. If you don't like that big three, talk to Polinka, not us. We're just reporting what's happening. You didn't do it. And so you look at what they did. And I gave you AD statistics. LeBron, 25 points, 12 assists.

Starting point is 00:05:19 Like he's really leaning into that. that distributor role over the last week or so, especially, you know, 12 to 25 from the floor, so reasonably efficient, did not, only took one three the entire night, which I thought was, was kind of an interesting turn for how LeBron's offense has been. And then Reeves, 16 points, five rebound, seven assists, and, you know, just solid work, I think, throughout most of the game. So that, like, that foundation is what they need from a starting standpoint. And then you can start to talk about the other guys.

Starting point is 00:05:53 And you got a couple really nicely timed threes from Dore and Phiney Smith. One to open the game, one later on when the Lakers were kind of continuing to keep control. Max Christie was four or five. They got 13 points from Dalton Connect, who suddenly seems to be an NBA caliber basketball player again and makes a huge difference to what they're doing. I thought it was really at least potentially significant and nothing else that Dalton didn't just hit three-three. in this game, they were on the road. Because if you look at Dalton's splits,

Starting point is 00:06:25 he is shooting about 10, 11% better at home versus on the road from deep. And we've talked about before, Dalton's scoring is what ultimately, in the shooting in particular, is what makes him playable when you put him out there or not playable if it isn't happening. Christie hit back-to-back corner threes from the opposite corner that really helped get things going. mentioned DFS, he started in place of Rui, who had a CAF issue that made him go from

Starting point is 00:06:58 available to questionable to out in about 12 or so hours. And obviously, when we've talked before you and I about wanting to see DFS in the starting lineup, we meant it with Rui coming off the bench as opposed to Rui not playing. But that being said, Doreen Phine Smith plus 20 in a little, you know, shade under 26 minutes in this game, you know, the numbers will not jump off the page, eight points, three rebounds, but the fit really does. Like, it's one of those times where the plus 20, if you watch the game, it makes sense.

Starting point is 00:07:37 And it also speaks to why you and I have both been saying, it makes more sense for him to start. It makes more sense, frankly, for Rui to come off the bench where I think he will be utilized better. It's just the whole thing. like it's it's silly like to say like you know the season starts when you know and all that but like they've needed they were one of the big things that I was wrong about last year was how dependent they were on Jared Vanderbilt it's not that he's an all-star but there's just nothing to replicate

Starting point is 00:08:12 what he does on the rest of the roster and so I was like okay well I undersold that I thought they were able to make up some of that stuff in other spots around with different players. And they just couldn't. And so you're putting him back in. And every time you can add like Dorian Finney Smith or Jared Vanderbilt or Max Christie into the, especially defensively, it starts to move guys into more appropriate defensive matchups. You're less dependent on Anthony Davis to cover every mistake because there are other guys who can pick up players and do things.

Starting point is 00:08:47 If you want to aggressively switch and do that kind of stuff, you have more guys who can do it. When you put Christy and Finney Smith and Vanderbilt and AD on the floor together, you know, LeBron is out there or whatever it is, like, whatever it is. Like you can do a lot with those kinds of defenders because they have the versatility to both to switch, but also if you want them to, to chase through a screen, to do it. It just makes a big difference because you're just, you're opening up options for JJ Redick.

Starting point is 00:09:20 Vando played about 12 and a half minutes, finished with six points, four rebounds, two assists, three steals. We can get deeper into the Vando effect from him coming back. And, you know, like you mentioned, it's going to be revved up. I would imagine it's going to be 10, 15, maybe 17 minutes if you're really pushing things, you know, feeling saucy for a, a week, two weeks, whatever, so you really maybe even goes to the road trip.

Starting point is 00:09:48 Yeah, well, we'll see how it looks. They definitely don't want to go back to square one with this. But let me just read you a quick list I had in my notes from just the first half from Vando in about, I don't know, maybe six minutes. He had a really good defensive rebound in traffic that I believe the Lakers ended up scoring on that possession. He had a putback basket on an Anthony Davis miss, got a steal against Moses. movie and then set a really good screen that helped clear a path for Dalton Connect in transition

Starting point is 00:10:19 to get to the basket. You see on both sides of the ball things that jump out, things that are the proverbial little things that Vando does. It brings a different dimension to what the Lakers can do. I mean, he's not a superstar. Vando's return doesn't make them front-running contenders, but it does legitimately, and this is a point that I've been hitting for the last couple of years, he is in his own right, the least replicable, replicable player on this roster in terms of guys who does the things that he does in one player. So yeah, I mean, like, and we'll talk about the, you know, the overall, again, the defense looking better and like, you know, DFS and some of the, you know, the impacts there.

Starting point is 00:11:10 and you know, you pointed out as we were getting ready to start. I sort of had a little volume down for a lot of the, you know, while I was watching. I didn't realize stuff was scoreless in the second half. I didn't do any, I didn't know he did too much. But it only was only after the game that I was like, oh, scoreless. That's pretty good. Yeah. They did a very good job.

Starting point is 00:11:30 Even in the first half of the game when there were too many open threes for the Lakers liking, they still, I thought, did a really good job throughout this game, hounding Steph, whether you're talking about Max, whether you're talking about DFS, whether you're talking about, I think Reeves at times. Gabe Vincent, they, AD got matched up on Steph a couple times, did a nice job against them. It was very clear. It was like we are not that it requires basketball genius to say,

Starting point is 00:12:00 let's try to slow down Steph Curry, but it's very clear they said, let's try to slow down Steph Curry. Well, particularly, you know, that's another place where, you know, we mentioned AD at the beginning of the show. You know, obviously we know Dremont. It makes a difference in how he's going to be defended. But like that's another thing that makes a big difference in how the warriors run their offense. And so when Dremont's not there, these like pressure valves and releases and all these other stuff they do,

Starting point is 00:12:24 they don't have a lot of other guys who can replicate you. So you can really hound Steph confident that the ball's not going to find other places as well as it should. But four of 17 for Steph, 13 points on the night. And I did mention, you know, so again, the defense looking better, but Connect thing before we were going to talk about this a little bit this week. Like the Lakers need him to be productive off the bench. And part of the reason they were having so much trouble scoring is he wasn't. You trade DeAngelo Russell in part because you think you have a guy there

Starting point is 00:12:55 who can give you 8 to 14 a night relatively consistently or something like that. And when Connect fell off a cliff offensively, it may, It really hurt them. If he can play with some consistency, it's going to make a huge difference going forward. Anyway, we will, of course, be back. Lakers are off on Sunday, but the road trip continues on Monday. We'll have a show for you tomorrow, get you ready for the rest of the road trip. Lots of stuff, Andy, but first.

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Locked On Lakers - Daily Podcast On The Los Angeles Lakers - Lakers Beat Warriors 118-108. Davis Dominates, Vanderbilt Returns!

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