EL SEGUNDO — For most of the NBA, the All-Star break truly is … a break.
Don’t imagine that the Lakers spent their week off working on their chemistry or studying up on game plans. Anthony Davis was in Mexico, tuning into All-Star weekend broadcasts by accident if at all during his vacation. He didn’t review the tape of the Lakers’ victory over the New Orleans Pelicans while lounging beachside.
But that doesn’t mean he wasn’t at least thinking about it.
“It’s always tough when you have a great game and then you go into break and now you got a week where it’s just the anticipation is there and you don’t know whether it’s a one-game fluke,” Davis said Wednesday. “Hopefully, (expletive), for us it wasn’t. But you’re anxious and excited to go back out there and try to do it all over again.”
The Lakers get back on the court on Thursday night against the defending champion Golden State Warriors, a team they beat shortly before the break with a new-look but LeBron James-less lineup. This time, they expect to have James, who was given an extra day off on Wednesday after suiting up as the team’s lone All-Star.
James called the remaining regular-season schedule “23 of the most important games of my career.” Even though James was absent from Wednesday’s practice, that sense of urgency was palpable among the rest of the team.
“I couldn’t agree with him more. It’s what’s in front of him,” Coach Darvin Ham said. “He’s done amazing things, had an amazing career – not just basketball, not just him in regards to our season but just in life in general. That should be your mentality: what’s in front of you.”
The Lakers have to beat the odds to make the playoffs at 13th place in the Western Conference, 3½ games out of sixth place and two games out of 10th place for the final play-in berth. FiveThirtyEight gives them 35% odds to earn a playoff spot; Basketball Reference gives them a 15% chance.
Statistical models,…
Read the full article here
