{"id":445806,"date":"2025-12-01T07:07:11","date_gmt":"2025-12-01T07:07:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/445806\/"},"modified":"2025-12-01T07:07:11","modified_gmt":"2025-12-01T07:07:11","slug":"lakers-vs-suns-discussion-injury-report-how-to-watch","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/445806\/","title":{"rendered":"Lakers vs Suns Discussion, Injury Report, How To Watch"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Lakers (15-4) will be back in Crypto.com Arena again on Monday when they take on the Phoenix Suns. Los Angeles looks to extend their winning streak to eight and improve their division record to 3-1.<\/p>\n

Start time and TV schedule<\/p>\n

Watch: Spectrum Sportsnet<\/p>\n

It\u2019s been fun writing this sentence, so allow me to keep doing it while I can: The Lakers are rolling. Outside of the Oklahoma City Thunder, who have won 12 straight games, the purple and gold are the hottest team in the league. They closed November having won seven straight games, which is the ideal way to enter a tough month ahead.<\/p>\n

The Lakers\u2019 December schedule presents a challenge for the purple and gold. Besides competing in the knockout round of the NBA Cup, they have a road-heavy month that includes a tough East Coast swing. Then there\u2019s obviously the Christmas Day game <\/a>and a couple of matches against their divisional opponents, including Monday\u2019s against the Suns.<\/p>\n

As I\u2019ve reiterated many times in my previews, games against division opponents are extra vital because they play a huge role in determining seeding in the standings. Divisional records are a tiebreaker in playoff seeding, underscoring the importance of these games. Currently, the Lakers lead the Pacific Division with the Suns trailing by 3.5 games, followed by the Golden State Warriors, L.A. Clippers and Sacramento Kings.<\/p>\n

For the Lakers to remain comfortable on top, it\u2019s important that they win Monday\u2019s game. They\u2019re not going to have the rest advantage after beating the injured New Orleans Pelicans<\/a> on Sunday \u2014 which was an opponent they should\u2019ve put to bed early but alas \u2014 so this makes this one a little tougher.<\/p>\n

The Suns aren\u2019t pushovers. They\u2019re better compared to last season because of improvement on the defensive end. Right now, the stats indicate that Phoenix is an average team but is still very much capable of winning any game, especially when they\u2019re not taken seriously.<\/p>\n

The head of their team is no other than Devin Booker, who is averaging 25.7 points, 6.9 assists and 4.4 rebounds per game this season. They also have guys like Dillon Brooks, Grayson Allen and Mark Williams who will definitely compete hard in this one.<\/p>\n

Hopefully, fatigue won\u2019t be much of a factor. Luka Don\u010di\u0107 will likely remember that he\u2019s going up against Booker, which is something he takes personally all the time. Having a rested LeBron James should help a lot, too. If the Lakers can shoot better than they did against the Pelicans (36.5 percent) and Doncic and Austin Reaves continue to play at a high level, this should be a win again for the Lakers.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s see if L.A. can start December on a strong note with a win against their division rival on Monday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Lakers (15-4) will be back in Crypto.com Arena again on Monday when they take on the Phoenix…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":445807,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3791],"tags":[7,64012,6,2065,472,4045,604],"class_list":{"0":"post-445806","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-phoenix-suns","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-los-angeles-lakers-discussion","10":"tag-nba","11":"tag-phoenix","12":"tag-phoenix-suns","13":"tag-phoenixsuns","14":"tag-suns"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/115643052483444481","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/445806","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=445806"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/445806\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/445807"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=445806"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=445806"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=445806"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}