If Wednesday night was truly a preview of the NBA Finals, the Los Angeles Lakers have work to do. In their first matchup with the Philadelphia 76ers of the season, the Lakers were forced to play catch up and Philadelphia didn’t let them complete the comeback, beating them 107-106 thanks to an incredibly tough shot from Tobias Harris in the final seconds of the game.
Free-throws have been a bit of a problem for the Lakers this season and Wednesday night was no different. As a team, the Lakers shot 64% from the charity stripe. Davis, who’s a career 80% free-throw shooter, made five of his 10 free-throw attempts. For the season, he’s shooting 71.1% from the free-throw line.
Obviously, free throws aren’t the only reason the Lakers lost the game, but when you lose a game by as thin of a margin as they did, the missed ones hurt more, and they certainly stand out in the box score more.
The good news is that Davis had a bounce-back game otherwise, tallying 23 points, 8 rebounds, 2 assists and 2 blocks. He still doesn’t look like he’s fully himself, but he showed up when it counted, and he definitely looked better than he did against the Cleveland Cavaliers on Monday. LeBron James led all scorers with 34 points.
Wednesday marked their first loss on the road of the season. Prior to Wednesday, the Lakers were 10-0 on the road, which was a franchise-best for them. The Lakers will try and start a new road winning streak when they take on the Detroit Pistons on Thursday.
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