LOS ANGELES — The Lakers were one of the league’s hottest teams entering the All-Star break, winning six of seven games before the annual mid-February stoppage of regular-season play.
Since returning from the break, they’ve gone 1-1 after Thursday’s road loss to the Golden State Warriors and Friday’s home win over the San Antonio Spurs – a victory coach Darvin Ham critiqued after the Spurs cut the Lakers’ double-digit third-quarter leads to single digits late in the third.
“It’s tough to win in this league,” Ham said. “Totally grateful to come out on top of this one. But it’s not just looking at whoever is right there in front of you, it’s also looking at yourself and trying to see different ways you can get better and correct whatever mistakes were made the last go around, the last game, whatever, the last possession. And try to sustain the good things you’re doing.”
Despite being shorthanded, the Lakers pulled out the victory in large because of their talent advantage over the middling Spurs and the late play from LeBron James, who finished with 30 points, nine assists and seven rebounds in his return to the lineup after missing the previous two games because of left ankle peroneal tendinopathy.
“It’s a coach’s thing,” Ham said. “You want your team to constantly look within and try to make plays and force the other team to put you in uncomfortable positions. Not you put yourself in those uncomfortable positions, whether it’s not sprinting back in transition or allowing teams to get two or three offensive rebounds. Or fouling because we’re not in position because we’re not doing our work early. And then going down the other end and not trusting the execution.
“We’ve got a bunch of weapons, but they’re useless if we don’t do the little things – sprinting hard when we get the ball in transition, not turning it over, maintaining spacing, making sure we get hits on screens to create an advantage and making the…
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