On both Jackson 3 point shots the D was solid on Ellis and Baron Davis.

And count me in with Daruis — this is Phil’s MO. The best way to beat the Warriors is pounding them inside and the two Lakers who can do that are in street clothes. He is limited in options but doing a lot with what he has to keep winning.

Also, I didn’t see a zone on that last JackO 3. Fisher just did not respect Jackson’s range and sagged a little too much. KD pointed out over at the Yahoo blog, that JackO shoots a flat footed jumper and does not need his legs to get off late game jumpers when he’s tired, and Fish needed to recognize that as well as Jackson’s range, as well as the fact that Jackson had already hit FIVE(!) 3′s. I saw that as a classic defensive lapse where we were too anxious to help (which is ironic considering that Phil had just ripped into them for that same thing on the play before) and we got burned. All of Kobe’s heroics won’t be enough if you have mental lapses in key situations on defense.

And one other thing on Luke…Do we really need a whipping boy? I tire of us always having to have a guy to pick on and being the guy we blame for losses. As I mentioned above, there were several players that made bad plays/mistakes/mental errors that led to missed oppurtunities or let the Warriors capitalize and get points. I saw so many that had nothing to do with Luke, but his name pops up in the comments of every game chat, win or lose. I’m not saying people can’t have an opinion. But Luke is not our only player that deserves to get called out, much less every game. It was the same with Lamar earlier this year, and it got to the point where Kurt had to put up a “Lamar is what he is” post. I mean even when these guys play(ed) well, they still get backhanded compliments and “unlike usual” comments about them having good games. Sorry for the rant, I just feel like all these players bring stuff to the table to help us win. And every player (including Kobe) do things during a game that contribute to losses. I feel like every player deserves our support, unless they continually commit egregious errors that consistently lead us to losses. Luke is not that guy. We don’t have one guy on our roster like that. Sorry again.

The funny part? Had we won, Kobe would have been raving about the team’s defense, as he has in all of his recent post-game interviews. Which Kurt has rightly pointed out that we win in spite of of defense.

Sigh. Nothing to see here. Move on.

But to me, what bothers me the most, isn’t Luke being in for Ronny (which could have something to do with FT, I hope)… it’s the fact that Stephen Jackson had enough time to shoot the second 3-pointer that worries me.

First of all, the Lakers are down by one and the Warriors have the ball with 30 seconds to go on the clock. You cannot go zone or diamond-one or whatever there. You must go man-to-man and you cover the three point shot. It’s better to concede a 2 pointer than a 3 pointer.

Now, here’s what kills me. Each NBA team plays 82 regular season games, so you know each player’s weaknesses and strenghts. What you should do is, get your best on-ball defender on Baron Davis and force him to the left side of the court (since he’s right-handed) while keeping a big body inside (Ronny). You let him go as far as the baseline and invite him to shoot. If he shoots, since he’s right handed, you have more probability to successfully contest it, as his shooting arm is closer to you. If he drives to the hoop, you trap him with the big body and some help from the weakside.

What you DON’T do is give help from the strong side. What you DON’T do is give help from the weak side if your man is in the center of the court waiting to shoot a three.

But maybe, we should’ve played defense from the start of the game, and not be in this position at the end…