Finally...

Finally, these so called experts are recognizing the Lakers defense.  The defense that exposed and discombobulated the Nuggets offense.  The defense that was a huge contributing factor in allowing the Lakers to “sweep”.  During the Lakers/Nuggets series we had to listen to how the Nuggets imploded, how it was all on them, but hello did anyone take a look at the shooting percentages of AI and Carmelo.  The Lakers went into that series on an obvious mission and that was not to let AI and Carmelo have great offensive games.  Mission Accomplished.

Coming into this series some people actually have the Utah Jazz favored.  Yes, the same team that went 17-24 on the road.  Some prognosticators don’t think the Lakers can bang with the Jazz.  Apparently they have a physical style of play and the Lakers won’t be able to bang for seven games.  Who even said the series was going to go seven games? 

Again, the Lakers showed that they are a really good defense team, barring lapses from time to time.  The Jazz tried to bang but I think this worked in our favor.  You can’t complain when on one end of the court, you jumped on someone’s back, leading to a no call then on the other end someone jumps on your back and you get a no call.  Shut up and play.  Remember this is your style of play and the Lakers are just adapting.  In the first half, the Lakers were pretty much doing what they wanted to do defensively and the offense was pushing the ball.  The second half was a different story.  Someone woke up the Jazz during half time and told them this was the first game in the second round of the playoffs.  They came out and played their style of basketball (they had a whopping 25 offensive rebounds) but the Lakers didn’t hang their heads.  Why you ask, well, because the Jazz shot a paltry 37.9% from the field.  It was like they had me on the court for the whole game playing shooting guard.  They couldn’t buy a basket.

Will this trend of not being able to consistently make their outside shots continue but let’s remember that we thought that at some point the Denver Nuggets were going to wake up and look what happened.  Maybe Kyle Korver will start draining threes but if he is unable to play any type of defense, how often will he be on the court.  Deron Williams is a great point guard, who has great upper body strength but Derek Fisher played him well defensively.  Can someone please wake up Carlos Boozer and let him know that his team is in the playoffs.  His scoring average is down and he keeps getting caught pushing in the back and grabbing the opposing players’ jerseys.  I thought rebounding was about positioning.  Guess I was wrong.

Now we all know that the Utah Jazz plays totally different when they are at home.  Their building is loud and they are right on top of you.  I guess you can liken it to a college basketball atmosphere.  But let’s not forget that the Lakers have won in their building this year and quite convincingly I might add.  That was in the regular season and these are the playoffs but are the two that different?  I think it all goes back to transition defense, the ability of the Jazz to stop the Lakers from running, offensive rebounding, and the Jazz’ ability/inability to stop Kobe Bryant.