I am way too tired/lazy to write a cohesive essay recapping the game, so you all get a recap in list form!
-The Hawks started off frostbite-cold (and pretty much finished frostbite-cold). They shot a combined 1-15 from three, 30-83 overall, and 19/28 from the free throw line! That’s 7%, 37%, and 68%. Part of that was the absolutely suffocating Laker defense, but a lot of it was the Hawks simply missing a ton of shots. The only reason their shooting line wasn’t any worse was a 6-9 night from Al Horford, whose face said (to me) “Please let me be traded.”
-The Lakers absolutely crushed the Hawks in the 1st quarter, leading 28-15 after 12 minutes. Derek Fisher hit his first 3 shots (a clear foreshadowing of what was to come) and the Lakers never looked back. They missed 4 shots the entire quarter, and the lead would’ve been even larger had they not turned the ball over 4 times.
-The bench for the Lakers came out in the second quarter and played terribly for the first 6 minutes. And by terribly, I mean as bad as the Hawks were playing, so the lead only dwindled from 13 to 9. Keep in mind, the Lakers won the game by 24 points, and Luke Walton was -5. Please come back soon, Matt Barnes.
-Can someone please tell me when Steve Blake plans on joining the Lakers? Seems absurd to me that they’re paying him $4 million this year and he has yet to show up…
-To be totally honest, I only half-watched the game after halftime. I was much too busy constructing witty (to me, at least) one-liners on Twitter, listening to my Spanish commentators exclaim “Joshay Smee!!!!” and seeing Josh Smith jacking up a three.
-The 2nd half of this game was really a formality. The Hawks had given up by then and Joe Johnson’s face told me “Man, at least I’m making $1293487 billion dollars a year.”
-Bynum was a complete beast on defense. He finished with 3 blocks and 15 boards, while having at least 5 altered shots which led to horrible misses by the Hawks. Sure he had only 5 points, but he played his role and brought the intensity on defense which was the real cause of the Laker lead.
-One thing about Ebanks and Caracter: say what you want about them being rookies and inexperienced; those guys go hard. Even though it was junk time in a massive blowout, they fought for rebounds and went hard to the basket. Good signs for future Laker depth.
-The Lakers had very balanced offense. The threesome of Kobe, Pau, and Shannon Brown led the way (that one’s for you, Steve W), with 20, 14, and 15 points, respectively. Artest had 11 points on 4-7 shooting, while Fisher chipped in with 10 points. Every Laker scored, even Joe Smith on a fancy, Kobe-esque turnaround. And when Joe Smith scores, you know it’s been a good game for the Lakers.
Overall, it was nice for a change to have a team play absolutely terribly against us. The Lakers, fresh from the All-Star Break, seemed to be expecting the other team’s best, like they had received in the previous few games. But the Hawks showed up and played terribly, while the Lakers showed the defensive intensity and the offensive flow of a championship team. Combine those two and you get a 24 point blowout. Let’s hope this is a good start to the rest of the regular season.
Spartacus says
The title says it all. In a game where Joe Smith played…it simply means the Lakers walloped whoever have they faced tonight. By the way Joe Smith could have also played in a game were the lakers were blown out early but such is a far fetched thing to happen specially on a home game after the all-star break, hence, the first assumption is more logical when the title says Joe Smith played.
Chris D says
Just the kind of game we needed after the All Star break and before that, absymal losses (to relatively flawed teams no less). Hopefully this is the beginning of a new trend for the remainder of the season leading up to the playoffs.
Also, did anyone happen to read an article by some doofus named Jason Whitlock declaring Kobe “done” as a player. Admittedly, as Laker fans, we’ve been used to hearing this drivel for about 18 months now from so called “experts”. Just in case you missed it, here it goes
http://msn.foxsports.com/nba/story/nba-all-star-game-kobe-bryant-is-no-longer-a-leading-man-022011
I don’t know about you guys, but the Kobe Bryant I saw last night hardly looks “done”. But that’s just me.
Joel says
Chris
Kobe said it all regarding Jason Whitlock and his article and statements…”wow…that’s just silly…next”
On another note, I was at the game last night and the whole crowd was behind the rookies. Although, it was a blowout, most of the crowd stayed and were cheering own Ebanks and Caracter. The crowd was so excited when Caracter made that last basket.
On a sour note the lakers still had quite a few defensive breakdowns, but the Hawks were not connecting from three, if they had been early it the game, it would’ve been a tight one. Nonetheless, good overall game for the lakers and good start to this last stretch of games.
chris y says
@2
Kobe is playing almost 34 minutes a game this season. his lowest since his rookie year and NOBODY is talking about it. AND he is still averaging 25 5 5. This guy who claims kobe is done is just looking for some attention. We are talking about 3 consecutive trips to the finals. That eventually takes its toll on the body and mind, plus the olympics with all the injuries. Kobe is going to go down as one of the true warriors of the game. Last night kobe recognized his bigs came out playing hard D and agressive O and fed them the play only taking 11 shots! If they do that every night he will pass it to them every night. Kobe is not going to give you anything he feels that his fadeaway from 30 ft has a better chance to go in then Andrew’s lazy hooks if Andrew had some prescence down there kobe would feed him all the time. Kobe is not done as a player he’s not even close. If anything after 2-3 more years of this he could probably prolong his career by becoming more of a Ray Allen Rip Hamilton player. He has the record for most 3s in a game. Kobe is visibly declining physically but give the guy a break do you know how m any games he has player? when he finally gets some rest of take a year off like jordan did then we’ll see what happens but this man is a tank.
tsuwm says
>he could probably prolong his career by becoming more of a Ray Allen Rip Hamilton player.
would that he could! have you ever actually watched Ray Allen play?! he never stops moving (without the ball).