The future of the Los Angeles Lakers is looking brighter. A number of young Lakers impressed during the team’s Summer League run and with new head coach Luke Walton taking over, the new era of Lakers basketball is certainly promising.
Of course the Lakers are still in the infant stages of their climb back to the NBA’s elite and this is not something that is lost on Walton.
In his interview on AM 570 Sports’ LA Today with Bill Reiter and Leeann Tweeden, Walton had a very simple goal for this upcoming season:
“To start something. Start something special. I think that the front office and them have done a very good job of building this young talent over the last couple of years and now we’ve added some nice vets to help win games, but also to show the young guys what it’s like to be a professional in this league and what it takes to win in this league.”
Walton added that he believes the wins will come as long as the foundation is set right:
“So my biggest concern right now is just getting the foundation set for the future; for the next years to come of playing the right way, practicing the right way, competing on both ends of the court, whether it’s practices or games or anything like that […] I think the wins will kind of take care of themselves once you turn those habits into the way we do things everyday.”
Walton definitely has the right mindset coming into this season as establishing the right culture and foundation with these new Lakers is the most important thing. Veterans like Luol Deng and Timofey Mozgov will help the process, but it will be the young kids like D’Angelo Russell and Brandon Ingram buying in that will make the difference.
The Lakers have the pieces in place to start building back to relevance in the NBA. If Walton is able to accomplish his goal for this season, it will only be a matter of time before everything else begins falling into place.