Los Angeles Lakers
(41-25, 1st Pacific Division, 3rd Seed Western Conference)
Talk about the time to be a fan of LA sports. The LA Kings are one game away from the Stanley Cup Finals. The LA Dodgers are sitting in first place in the NL West, and are one of the top teams in baseball. Both LA basketball teams made it to the second round of the NBA playoffs, but both teams got bounced from that round. Still some a good sports town, and their fans are definitely passionate about that. So let’s take a look at how the Lakers season unfolded.
Some people were calling for the Lakers demise after seeing Chris Paul go to the Clippers. There was a trade for Chris Paul to the Lakers, but the NBA blocked it, hence setting him up to go to the Clippers. I think people weren’t sure what Kobe Bryant had left in the tank, and how this team would really gel throughout the season. I figured they would make it through the season all right, and wasn’t having any high hopes of what they could do in the postseason.
Starting off the season, the Lakers were going up and down with a 13-9 record that included a three game losing streak, but also included a five game winning streak. They did lose to the Other LA bball team in late January, which I am sure made those LA fans happy.
8-5 in the month of February didn’t make things get any easier for the Lakers, but they were still sitting right in the middle of the Western Conference. A cople of signature wins in this month would be beating Boston in overtime and beating the defending champs Dallas Mavericks late in the month.
Another good month of basketball came in March, where the Lakers beat Miami in what some called a possible NBA Finals game. Or at least what the media would hope would be a Finals match up. Kobe going against Lebron would be the media’s dream come true.
The Lakers turned it on when they needed to come the last month of the season as they had some winning streaks of three and four games. This would help them close out the lead on the division, and earn the division title. They locked up the third seed in the Western Conference and would face the Denver Nuggets come first round of the playoffs.
Denver would look outmatched by the Lakers in the first round as the Lakers took a 2-0 lead. But the Nuggets fought back and actually forced a game seven. That game seven the Lakers took care of business in LA and would face the Oklahoma City Thunder in the second round.
This time, the Lakers were the outmatched team. Game one of this second round series saw the Thunder win 119-90. Then the Lakers lost a couple of leads in this series, where they could have been tied or up in the series. There was some calling out of teammates by Kobe Bryant and just looks of frustration from this Lakers team. The Thunder put them away last night with a 106-90 win, and we could have possibly seen the last of the Bryant, Gasol, and Bynum era. Interested to see where Bynum ends up next year if he’s not with the Lakers. Good chance that Gasol isn’t there as well, and who knows what Bryant will be working with.