The Los Angeles Lakers kicked off a difficult five-game in seven-day stretch on Monday night, going on the road to take on the Sacramento Kings.
There was some added intrigue for this game after Dennis Schroder recently got into a physical altercation with Luka Doncic after the last time these two teams met on Dec. 28. Schroder was suspended for this game, but that didn’t matter as the Kings were able to beat the Lakers, 124-112.
LeBron James got the Lakers off to a quick start with six straight points. The Lakers’ defense was on point early, leading to a fastbreak layup for Doncic to take an 8-2 lead and force a Kings timeout.
After James’ hot start, Doncic got going offensively with a pair of midrange buckets, a spinning layup and a triple. Before things got out of hand though, the Kings responded with a 7-0 run. Sacramento carried that momentum through the end of the quarter, taking a 32-28 lead.
The Lakers went ice cold offensively to end the first and start the second as no one could hit an outside shot. The Kings weren’t having an issues though as they quickly extended their lead to double digits.
Malik Monk was absolutely on fire against his former team as he made five triples in a row to continue growing Sacramento’s lead. The Lakers did have a strong close to the half, led by Doncic. He beat the buzzer with a triple to give himself 26 points at the break and cut L.A.’s deficit to 61-54.
DeMar DeRozan and Russell Westbrook opened the third quarter strong to quickly get the Kings lead back to double digits. Sacramento opened the third quarter on an 18-5 run, extending their lead to 20 as the Lakers remained ice cold and faced a huge uphill battle to get back in it.
Doncic wasn’t ready to give up though as he was the one player in purple and gold that could score, getting the deficit down to 95-83 going into the fourth.
With Sacramento showing no signs of cooling off, Gabe Vincent hit a pair of triples early in the final quarter to try to keep up with them. After a pair of free throws by James, the Lakers were back within single digits.
That was as close as L.A. would get, however. DeRozan and Monk continued to pour it on while the Lakers just couldn’t get anything going offensively to go on a sustained run, resulting in the loss.
What’s next for the Lakers
The Lakers will return home and host the Atlanta Hawks on Tuesday in the second night of a back-to-back before a matchup with the Charlotte Hornets on Thursday.
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