Locked On Lakers - Daily Podcast On The Los Angeles Lakers - Lakers Bounce Back Behind 31/9/10 from LeBron, 27 From Luka, Beat Hawks 141-116

Episode Date: January 14, 2026

The lid finally came off the hoop. The Lakers, who couldn't have been colder Monday night in Sacramento, hada completely different experience against the Hawks on Tuesday. They were red hot from the floor, scoring 81 points in the first half, and despite a horrible third quarter in which they allowed what had been a 32-point half was more than halved, they found their footing again in the final quarter and won going away, 141-116. The Lakers were led by LeBron James—playing both ends of a back-to-back for the first time this season—who was one rebound away from a triple-double (31/9/10) and Luka Dončić (27/5/12), but all five starters finished in double figures, including Deandre Ayton, who also grabbed a season-high 18 rebounds. Rui Hachimura returned to the lineup, scoring seven points in 18 minutes. Overall, the team shot 58% from the floor, including 56% from 3-point range, and hit 26-30 free throws (86%). They piled up 36 assists, and when they weren't playing a prevent offense (going so slowly to try and bleed clock) in the third, moved ball and man well. Buckets came off activity, which is always nice to see. As a team they have to hope that the opportunity to exhale, break the losing streak, and see the ball go through the hoop a few times lets everyone relax. The Lakers will have a chance to build on the good vibes on Thursday at home against Charlotte.  HOSTS: Andy and Brian Kamenetzky  SEGMENT 1: LeBron near trip-dub leads Lakers to win.  SEGMENT 2: Better movement, better results.  SEGMENT 3: Still more to clean up.  Everydayer Club  If you never miss an episode, it’s time to make it official. Join the Locked On Everydayer Club and get ad-free audio, access to our members-only Discord, and more — all built for our most loyal fans. Click here to learn more and join your team’s community: https://lockedonpodcasts.com/everydayerclub Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors!DoorDashFrom tipoff to overtime, stay in your bag and order on DoorDash.Get snacks, drinks, gear — whatever gets you through the season — delivered right to your door.DoorDash. In your bag all season long. ZocdocStop putting off your doctor’s appointments and get the care you need.Go to htps://Zocdoc.com/lockedonnba to find and instantly book a top-rated doctortoday.WayfairGet last-minute hosting essentials, gifts for all your loved ones, and decor to celebrate the holidays for WAY less.Head to https://Wayfair.com right now to shop all things home. Wayfair. Every style. Every home.  GametimeToday's episode is brought to you by Gametime. Download the Gametime app, create an account, and use code LOCKEDONNBA for $20 off your first purchase. Terms and conditions apply.FanDuelToday's episode is brought to you by FanDuel. The NBA and NFL seasons are here, visit the FanDuel App today and start planning your futures bets now. FANDUEL DISCLAIMER: 21+ in select states. First online real money wager only. Bonus issued as nonwithdrawable free bets that expires in 14 days. Restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Gambling Problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit FanDuel.com/RG (CO, IA, MD, MI, NJ, PA, IL, VA, WV), 1-800-NEXT-STEP or text NEXTSTEP to 53342 (AZ), 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org/chat (CT), 1-800-9-WITH-IT (IN), 1-800-522-4700 (WY, KS) or visit ksgamblinghelp.com (KS), 1-877-770-STOP (LA), 1-877-8-HOPENY or text HOPENY (467369) (NY), TN REDLINE 1-800-889-9789 (TN) Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

LeBron James is one rebound away from a triple double, and the Lakers bounce back and break a three-game losing streak. 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, your first listen of every day,

Monday through Friday, no matter how or where you get your podcast, this one's always free, and everyone on paywall, and no matter how you get it, Spotify, Apple. Maybe you're one of the 37,000 subscribers who are subscribing to the Lockdown Lakers YouTube channel. No matter how you're doing it, you are part of making the Lockdowne podcast network, the number one sports podcast network in this or any other known universe. Brian Keminetsky, Andy Kaminetsky, long time covering the Lakers, 20 years near 20 years for the L.A.

Times. ESPN for the athletic for 710 radio and in LA. And this, Andy, was a little bit of a nice bounce back for the Lakers 141, 116. They finally got the lid to come off the basket where it had been firmly placed for the last couple weeks. Lakers shot the ball well. They moved with some purpose. And aside from a really bad end of the third quarter, much, much, much, much better, certainly than Monday in Sacramento. What I thought was really interesting just to start this game. And there is a bit of armchair psychiatry going on in terms of what I'm about to say, but I don't actually think that I'm wrong.

And I think JJ implied this to some degree. LeBron and Luca both entered this game listed as questionable. And with LeBron, that was actually expected just because the second end of a backerner. to back. LeBron had actually said that back-to-backs were essentially TBD for the rest of his life in basketball, probably including like rec league when he's in his 50s. I don't know if he can play two games in a row as a given. Imagine you're just, you're at your rec league and LeBron shows up like that. That would be quite intimidating. Well, you show up the next day just to see if he can be there and see if he can actually

still do it. But Luca had also been listed as questionable. He had been dealing with Dave McMeneman reported from ESPN, some groin soreness. And I've noted actually on a couple shows, and I believe you as well, that over the last couple of weeks, at times it has seemed like Luca's been physically uncomfortable on the court. So there had been a lot of anticipation that this could be a game that neither Luca and LeBron where they're on top of Austin not being there, second end of a back-to-back, against a Hawks team that's better than their record and has the type of athletic players that can give the Lakers problem at full strength, this could end up just another loss part

of a bad week. LeBron and Luca end up playing. And these were truly game time decisions. I can't help but feel like based on the way the Lakers began this game, that there was some inspiration felt and used by their teammates, seeing Luca and LeBron both suit up. Like I know, I mean, I'll be making early shots, all that other stuff. But those two dudes being out there, you know, JJ said that he felt the two of them completely led the group tonight. He was saying that in terms of the assists and playmaking,

but I can't help but think he meant in all facets, including just putting on their damn uniforms tonight. I want to let people know that today's episodes brought you by Fandul before tip off, check the Fandual app to see what's dropping during NBA happy hour every Friday from 6 to 7.30 Eastern. I do wonder, I mean, I don't think he was asked directly after the game, whether had they won in Sacramento on Monday, whether that would have changed calculus for playing.

on Tuesday. But, you know, LeBron, this was a game the Lakers needed to win. Like they needed to win this game. They've dropped three in a row, and they needed

to give themselves a real chance to win. And so, you know, whatever the rules are about LeBron, he said, you know, I rested, I went through my routine. I felt okay,

decided to give it a shot. The subtext to me was, we needed to win this bleep in game and you know sometimes got to you know break out of what the the ideal might be because we screwed up on Monday and I don't have the luxury of sitting out and mercifully he did play thankfully he played and in man alive did he play well 31 points nine rebounds 10 assists for lebron he had a steel he had a block um in the fourth quarter when the lakers needed some buckets LeBron was, again, instrumental in helping them get those points.

He was good on the break. He was good, you know, moving the ball. Like everything about what LeBron was doing was closer to late vintage LeBron than, you know, certainly what we were seeing early in the season. And this was a performance the Lakers absolutely had to have. And LeBron was fantastic. He was fantastic. Luca was really good in this game.

He got going really hot, really early, other than a string of turnovers for Luca in this game. He got sloppy in the third. But also two in the first, he had back-to-back turnovers as well. He had seven turnovers in the game, and six of them were in successions of sort. In the first half, like I said, he had back-to-backs. And then in the third quarter, he had back-to-back-to-back turnovers.

After the third one, he ended up. up getting a technical upset that he felt like he got stripped due to excessive contact. But beyond the turnovers for Luca, 27 points on 7 of 16, 5 of 9 from behind the arc, 8 of 10 from the line, 12 assists, a couple of offensive rebounds. I thought he had several really good defensive plays in this game. He drew, I want to say, two or three charges. and the moment this game truly blew open, like the Lakers were up by 30 at one point in this game.

In the second quarter, Luca went on a three-point bonanza. And at one point, it was part of a 21-2 run in the second quarter. And it was like the third or fourth three that Luca had hit in that sequence. Luca even looked kind of shocked by this. and there was he actually he hit two threes Atlanta called timeout and after they called time out Luca went down to the other end of the court jumped up grabbed the rim like hung himself you know hung from it and you know at that point I'm like I guess this is the cure to groin soreness hit a bunch of threes out of the timeout Atlanta missed their next shot and

Luca hit another three and that was just a massive part of breaking this game open. He was, yeah, and so you look around and just the team in general, like the, the, the, the vibe around how they were playing and the body language and everything was really good. And that's in part because the Lakers were over 60% floor in the first half, put up 81 points in the first half. They were over 60% from the floor. They were about 55% from three. They'd hit about 90%, 95, I think, percent of their three, of their free three, of their free throw. to that point. On the night, the Lakers had 36 assists.

They finished to the night, 56% from a three-point range, and nearly 60% from the floor overall. Like, if you ever needed evidence about the effect that seeing the ball go through the basket can have on everything, not just your offense, not just your, but like on your defense, on your ball movement, movement on your energy, on your body language, this was the game to show it because the, you know, the, the Lakers, you know, they're probably even the Lakers aren't as bad as they were on Monday. And they're not as good as they were on Tuesday. But man, you just, you can see the weight

get lifted off of these guys when the ball goes in the basket, when you're making open shots. Now all of a sudden, everything seems possible when the ball starts flying around. It was just, I hope that some of this good feeling extends into Thursday's game, even if the shots don't quite fall at the same clip. JJ said afterwards that they had like a 10 minute meeting before the game. And he could tell the minute he said that, he was like, oh, crap, I just opened up a can of worms about team meetings and what was said. And from there, he kept just trying to downplay the idea that they even met it all. He's like, you know, we watched some Hawksfilm. We talked, you know, it just, we, we resolved ourselves to play with a higher level of competitiveness.

But to your, it felt like they began the game with the resolve to play the right way on all facets on both sides of the ball. And to your point about how much seeing the ball go down brings out the best habits and can make it become contagious. The third quarter, they started getting away from that. And that's when the ball started going in the basket less. That's when they started turning the ball over more. A few things started happening in that third quarter. I'm glad you mentioned it.

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w-A-Y-F-A-I-R dot com, Wayfair, every style, every home. So it's interesting like the Lakers came out and they were okay at the beginning of the quarter. They started the third quarter. Everything's like looking like it was in the first half and the leads going back up. And then they just decided it seemed like it was time to get fancy. And that is where they, I think, were feeling a little too good about themselves. and the ball was moving on and they're starting to move them you know there were a couple possessions where they

made 19 passes when like six would have done and you can shoot the ball and you know they got a little two on-suffer almost like out of rhythm in a from like happiness like you know it pushed them too far the other way they start getting really sloppy the Atlanta finally figures out ways to score and then the lakers slowed down to levels that we see when their offense is at their worst. They started trying to,

it seemed like to me, trying to bleed the clock a little bit and make each possession 22 seconds and end this game without having to really play aggressively. All of a sudden, the stuff we saw in the first half, ball movement, player movement, it all stopped.

and it took, I mean, I thought like, you know, Jake Laravia made a really important play later in the third quarter thing. They got it down to 12 or 13. La Ravia grabs an offensive rebound and gets a putback. LeBron had a critical three coming out of a timeout on a cross court pass from Luca. Like, they made important plays and actually quite quickly pushed the lead back up into a comfortable space and got some garbage time rest. but it was just shocking to me how much they slowed down to my eye in that stretch where Atlanta made that pushing and got back into it.

Yeah, it was happening mid to late in the third, also some of the fourth quarter. And look, they caught some breaks as well. Like there was a sequence in the fourth quarter where LeBron turned the ball over, but Kongwu blew what was meant to be an absolute thunder dunk. He just clanged it off the rim. That became a corner three for.

the Lakers and then Atlanta blew one of like a thousand layups. They smoked a lot of layups. They smoked a lot of layups in this game. Like on the following possession and on the other end, Luca got an end one out of it. And yes, the Lakers got lucky there, but at the same time, luck is part of all of this. What matters is how you capitalize on the luck.

You know, there are other teams that have frankly gotten lucky when the Lakers have screwed certain simple things up. and they've then capitalized on that. But with what you were talking about before, with getting away from what they had doing before, getting too fancy, getting too cute, then getting too conservative in the way they were doing this stuff,

we've covered the NBA, you know, the Lakers for a long time. And one of the things that I know I've noticed during this period is how hard it can be to be methodical over 48 minutes. Like one of the things, things that made the spurs during that period with Duncan and Parker and Manu, you know, Kauai, so hard to beat.

And why they were so consistently good is they were like the basketball equivalent of a metronome. And they were just steady and methodical. And they would do the same things over and over. And they would not get out of character at all. And sometimes they wouldn't play up to their high. highest level, but they never got out of character. And the Lakers have a habit of falling out of that methodical nature. It's like that scene in heat when Pacino and De Niro are having the dinerr, sit down. And De Niro reveals that he's got a girlfriend, but he also lives by a credo

that never get attached to anything you can't walk out on in 30 seconds flat when you spot the heat coming around the corner and Pacino asks him, are you going to leave your woman if that happens? And he says, yeah, that's the discipline. Like, the Lakers need to adopt De Niro-esque, although he screwed up at the end. He did

ultimately, he didn't maintain the discipline. There's the lesson. De Niro maintained that discipline for 90% of that movie. But then he had... It's a long movie. Yeah. But then he broke from that credo, ultimately cost him

his life. Well, I think one of the things I saw is when you can always learn lessons from heat. It really is phenomenal. And when when it started to turn and you could see like, look, I know Lakers fans at home were like, oh, bleep. Like there were a significant portion of Lakers fans who were pretty sure that they were going to figure out a way to, if not, lose this gigantic lead to somehow, at the very least, have it come down to the wire. And like, as we were talking about before the show started, like, you're left with a bad feeling on a night where you won and should feel great. Like, I am 100% sure that the big portion of Lakers fans were in that mind space,

because that's where the team has been over the last week or something. so. But what I really, what stuck out to me was just how much they started to just look at LeBron or just look at Luca. And it felt like all of this sort of empowerment that the supporting cast had earlier in the game where they're all feeling good about themselves and, you know, taking the shot when it was there and all that. It all kind of went away. And it was just sort of like, okay, stars lead us. And to some degree, okay, fine. That's part of what stars are supposed to do. But it's, it was, it was really noticeable.

Like you could just, to me, it looked like the confidence started to bleed out of, of the group. Which is why, by the way, I thought it was so important that La Ravia was one of the guys who made kind of one of these turning plays. to you know what I can do? I can crash the glass and I can do that kind of stuff. He was, you know, he did that and, you know, DeAndre Aiton had a couple big buckets down the stretch, eight and 18 rebounds, a season high. So like there were a,

you wanted to leave this game feeling good. And I think, I think they can because, you know, all five starters and double figures and all these other things. But I was just shocked at how they seemed to bleed confident. I was, it was very clear to me that they seemed to bleed confidence at that moment. But ultimately, though, they recovered and they got back on track.

And the supporting cast was actually a really big part of that. So let's talk about that coming up next. Lockdown Lakers is brought to you by Zock-Doc. Finding a doctor that you actually like can feel like discovering a diamond in the rough. My wife, it took years for her to finally land on one. that she felt comfortable with. You want someone in network nearby with availability, but you also want a doctor really listens,

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you want the experience to say the same. Do nothing. Just keep coming back as you've been doing every day. And we appreciate it. I was pleased that this game didn't become something that we all sit here going like, oh my God, how do they have to play

hard in the last two minutes to make sure they won this game. And so we can focus on five starters with double figures. We can focus on the return of Rui Hachamura, 10 points off the bench from Gabe Vincent. There are a lot of,

you can go back, Andy, and look at all the good stuff that happened and give it time because you're not consumed with what almost might have, maybe could have happened. Yeah, ultimately. This was a really good game for the team across the board. We mentioned the supporting cast.

I thought it was really significant. First of all, that Gabe and Jake, along with Luca, but those two hit the first threes that they attempted, just because given the backstory of the loss of Sacramento, I think that helps get off to a good start. Gabe Vincent was the first, Laker to hit double figures. He had 10 points in the first half.

And he actually, I thought, immediately came in and provided a really good spark for the team. It's funny. Marcus Smart had this stretch in the third quarter. It was like three or four possessions nearly in a row, but certainly within a few minutes of each other, where he was just attacking. Like there was one point where he went one on five Leroy Jenkins. but they all ended up working out. He got to the line two separate trips, made all four of the free throws.

And then another time, I believe he had either a layup or a jumper. But he got super, super aggressive. He and Jake made five threes between them. So given what they did not provide against Sacramento, I thought that was really significant. You mentioned Rui coming back. He actually had a great defensive sequence. in I think it was the second quarter where he deflected a pass out of bounds along the baseline. And then out of the dead ball, he trailed Corey Kisper really well and forced Kisper to step on the baseline out of bounds because he had nowhere to go.

He basically got trapped. And then karmically, Rui ended up getting rewarded with a jumper in the lane. He was under, as JJ said, a severe minutes restriction, but you can just tell that they benefit from having Ruibeck. And then this is two really good games in a row from D'Andre Aiton. And it's just worth noting because the last couple weeks had been very up and down. There have been a lot of attention on Aiton's focus and energy and reaction to not getting the ball as much as he would like or for.

frankly, he should get, but as much as they need to find ways to get in the ball, it's also on DeAndre to bring proactively that type of attention and aggression. And he did a really good job tonight, not just like putting up points, but moving, setting screens, like putting himself in really good positions. I just thought he was a really, really good game from DeAndre. Yeah, he had a couple opportunities to kind of, you know, make that choice between are you are you going to pass out

of a play in the post or you're going to put the ball on floor maybe make a move like look DeAndre Aiden is not a back to the basket catch the ball you know bang on his guy three or four times make a move

whatever where he meets resistance is usually where he chooses to put up a shot but you can still do it you can still be aggressive with you know am I going to shoot or am I going to pass

and it was nice to see DeAnd Gray choose aggression in this place because, you know, generally speaking, he is a high efficiency guy. He made seven of his nine shots in this game. And he's not high efficiency in the same way that Jackson Hayes is where everything is either a dunk or a layup. Like Aitin's making little floaters. He's putting up seven footers, nine footers, and stuff like that. So he moves the defense around in ways that Jackson doesn't. Jackson, by the way, didn't play in this game, nursing an injury, but the... He's actually getting imaging on it, so hopefully this does not turn into something serious. It is a hamstring? I believe it's a hamstring. Soft tissue. And so that was good,

but the big thing for me is the rebounding. Like, you know, you can, they need a rebound whether he's deeply involved in the offense or not. And he did that for sure. He was acted defensively. he you know he you know in terms of like you know guarding the rim and doing things like that and I just but there's also a lesson here and like what the what the offense has to look like in order for Aiton to kind of get the amount of touches like he's if it's when the offense gets really stagnant it's really hard to involve DeAndre 8 and um you know when when it's when the ball is moving when players are moving when there's screens set all over the floor, Aiden can be a big part of the offense.

And I think that's kind of one of the morals of the story from this game. It was a nice bounce back from La Ravia. He had 17 points. Everybody was shooting the lights out from three. I am excited to see Rui back on the floor. They just, they need those couple minutes. He hit one of three from three, but he had a couple, you know,

corner threes and like they didn't actually go in but it's nice to have somebody in the corner where when they shoot that shot you expect it to go in and that's how I feel about Rui my hope uh you know Thursday against Charlotte A that he plays I would be surprised if he didn't but you never know about how he feels the next day whatever his minutes limit JJ said was at 18 heading into this game and he played 18. So my hope is that they're going to keep looking safely to play Rui the absolute upper end limit of what they deem reasonable and what they deem doable because they just need him out there as a play finisher.

They need him out there as somebody that just provides more variety. for the offense, more options. Like, he can help prevent that level of stagnation. And as we've talked about, especially once he can play, what I imagine is going to be pretty big minutes if he ends up staying off the bench, if that ends up his role. Like, he can help spread around. It's still even off the bench.

He's probably playing close to 30 minutes a night. Right. And that ability to spread the scoring around is something that this team is really needed. Also, welcome Kobe Buffkin. By the way, also, to give me a reason to wear my Louis Hachamara shirt. There you go. Yeah. Haven't had a chance to wear it in a while.

I only wear it when Rui plays. A lot of games he played. Dang, it's been a little while since I could wear it. But Kobe Buffkin, who'd been with South Bay Lakers, got brought up on a 10-day contract. JJ said that he wasn't sure if Buffkin was actually going to be able to play in this game, but given that the Lakers ended up winning by 25, it created an opportunity for him against his old team. And he hit a three in four minutes against him,

also rebound and assist. I'm sure he really wanted to try in as short a window as he could to do as much damage against that team as possible. And remember, like a couple of weeks ago, I said that given the lack of scoring off the bench, I wouldn't have been surprised if Buffkin was given a look. Not that he's been an established score in the NBA. He hasn't, but he has NBA experience.

He'd been tearing up the G League. And they just, they need somebody. They need to try options. It's worth it just because, like, look, the guy, you know, he was hurt constantly in his time in Atlanta. And so he never really had a chance to really get going. And, you know, they never really could figure out how to get him involved and all that stuff. You know, I mean, some guys are four.

A players where they can tear up the G league, as you say, but can't quite replicate that at the NBA level. And if you have to have secondary skills and all that other stuff, I mean, Dalton connects running into this problem. Like you need to have a secondary skill set if you're not going to be a primary score. And so we'll see. But like, yeah, like it's a good use of a 10 day. It's a good, you know, they'll, I'm sure they will probably give him that second 10 day just

to see what, you know, if he plays even kind of well. They'll give them that second 10 day. And we'll see what happens after that. But it's worth a try. I will say this before we go, because I know the rest of the week or part of it's going to be taken up with talk about LeBron and LeBron's agent and things LeBron's agents talking about. And we talk about fit with LeBron and what's the future with LeBron and all these other things. And all these are all things that need to be talked about, especially the Rich Paul stuff. We just saw on the second night of a back-to-back, a 41-year-old dude come a rebound away from a triple double and look real good in the process of doing it.

And LeBron has sort of renormalized to, if not, you know, elite, elite levels of play still really good. It looks mostly kind of like LeBron. but I just think it's worth whether you like the guy or dislike the guy, whether you want him on the Lakers for longer than this season, which doesn't seem like very many of you, or you're ready for the LeBron era to be over. It is worth stopping to appreciate what the guy is continuing to do because it's kind of bonkers that we're talking about, you know,

Kyle Lowry is in his 20th season, but he doesn't get off the bench. Like I said at the top of the show, I do think that both LeBron and Lucas suiting up on the second end of a back-to-back when both had been in question provided a lot of inspiration and urgency for the team. Like if those guys sued up on the second end of this back-to-back when they have been questionable, like we talked about last year when LeBron really started to crank up his defense after that meeting with JJ, when the old man does it, nobody else has an excuse. to sloth off in any way. There is a similar principle here tonight, especially with LeBron. Like Luca playing through it is great, too. Don't get me wrong.

But Luca's in his prime. LeBron's 41. So there's a little extra something when LeBron ultimately does it. Again, it creates a lack of permission structure or takes away the permission structure for anybody else to either lose focus or not bring the energy and urgency,

because again, it ain't easy for LeBron to do this at his age. It is not. Locked on Lickers on YouTube is where you can go hang out with over 37,000 subscribers to the channel. We will talk a little bit about Rich Paul and his comments on his podcast about Austin. Lord, man. Oh, my, I mean, my goodness.

I hope you're coming around to my side of this when we first discuss this. Well, no, I mean, but we'll talk about it tomorrow because I'm kind of anticipated you getting all, you know, clucky about it. I think there. I was on the side of common sense. There's some fundamental differences about, you know, sort of the, what, what he said initially, uh, contextually and what he's saying now and we'll explain it all on tomorrow's episode of Lockdown Lakers and see you then.