Los Angeles Lakers head coach JJ Redick was clearly disgusted with the way his team played in its 122-102 loss to the short-handed Atlanta Hawks on Saturday. He said very little in his postgame press conference, but he did say that he could tell within the first two minutes of the game that his men weren’t ready to play.
By the time there were five minutes left in the first quarter, Los Angeles was already down by double digits, and it never made a real rally. Its defense was always a step slow, and it compounded that problem by committing 20 turnovers, which the Hawks turned into 36 points.
Forward Jake LaRavia, who has been in the Lakers’ starting lineup for the last three games, piggybacked on what Redick said by admitting the starting unit didn’t establish the right mentality.
“It’s always up to that first group to come out and set the tone and I just don’t think we really did that today,” LaRavia said. “We kind of came out and got punched in our mouth and didn’t really have an answer for it. They just outplayed us at the end of the day. We struggled defensively. We had some turnovers that were not very good and they were scoring off the turnovers which obviously doesn’t help.
“At the end of the day, it’s really up to that first group that starts to come out and set the tone and we just got to do a better job of that.”
LaRavia, who has been somewhat of a revelation for L.A., did play relatively well with 13 points, five rebounds, two assists, two steals and one block in 23 minutes. But overall, the team just didn’t have it, and its lack of energy and precision came in stark contrast to the grit and toughness it had shown in its nine games prior to Saturday.
The Lakers will have an opportunity to get back on track and restart their momentum when they visit the Charlotte Hornets on Monday. Saturday’s loss ended a five-game winning streak for them and dropped their record a bit to 7-3.