ORLANDO, Fla. — As Lakers coach JJ Redick sees it, his team’s recent woeful defensive performances are because of the bad habits the group developed on that end of the court over the previous couple of weeks while a few of their main players were injured.
But those bad habits are still lingering even with LeBron James, Rui Hachimura and Jaxson Hayes all back in the fold.
This was evident in the Lakers’ back-to-back losses to the Chicago Bulls at home on Saturday and Orlando Magic to kick off the four-game trip Monday as part of their three-game losing streak.
“We’re going through it a little bit,” Redick said after the loss to the Magic. “We gotta get back into the flow and the rhythm and those guys, it’s not just them getting back into their flow, but it’s the group and how the group functions.”
The group hasn’t been functioning anywhere close to the level they were on the defensive end of the floor recently, compared to nearly half of the season before the injuries started to impact availability.
The Lakers, who have lost seven of their past 10 games, have a defensive rating (points allowed per 100 possessions) of 119.3 dating to the March 8 road loss to the Boston Celtics, which was the first of four consecutive absences for Hayes and the game in which James injured his groin, which led to him sitting for two weeks.
This includes two of their worst defensive performances of the season with their losses to the Bulls – in which they allowed a season-worst 146 points – and the Magic.
The Lakers haven’t played with the same energy, focus and tenacity defensively compared to how they were earlier in the season.
They aren’t as physical. The resistance on opponents’ drives has dipped. So has the resistance at the rim.
The attention to the details has slipped.
“We gotta hold each other accountable and do it,” forward Dorian Finney-Smith said. “We’re asking to help each other, sit in gaps and that requires a lot of effort and energy. We gotta put [a] 48-minute game together.”
The Lakers’ defensive slippage comes after they had the league’s best defensive rating (107.6) during a 24-game stretch from Jan. 15 to March 6, and the second-best defensive rating (109.4) during a 38-game stretch from Dec. 8 to March 6.
“Like JJ said, we told on ourselves,” All-Star guard Luka Doncic said. “We know we can do it. And we just got to look back and maybe watch the film from those games, how we played. We were physical, we were flying around.”
The Lakers’ recent slide hasn’t hurt them too badly in the standings since most of the Western Conference teams around them have also struggled lately.
They entered Wednesday’s road game against the Indiana Pacers in fourth place in the West standings with a 43-28 record. The Lakers were just one game behind the Denver Nuggets for No. 3.
“We just gotta look back at the way we play on that eight-game winning streak,” Doncic said. “We [were] physical. We [have a] hell of a defense. We just got a little bit satisfied. We can’t afford that right now.”
BIG NIGHT FOR BRONNY
Less than a week after scoring his NBA career-high 17 points with the Lakers in a loss to the Milwaukee Bucks, rookie guard Bronny James turned in a career-best game in the G League, scoring 39 points to go with seven rebounds, four assists, four steals and one blocked shot in the South Bay Lakers’ 122-118 victory over the Santa Cruz Warriors on Monday night. He shot 14 for 21 from the field (4 for 8 from 3-point range).
The 20-year-old James’ previous G League-high for points was 31. The son of Lakers star LeBron James, he was reassigned to the G League this week ahead of the NBA team’s four-game trip.
In 23 games in the NBA this season, Bronny is averaging 2.3 points, 0.6 rebounds and 0.6 assists in limited minutes. In 17 G League games, he has averaged 18.7 points, 4.6 rebounds, 4.5 assists and 1.6 steals and is shooting 42.5% from the field and 32.7% from 3-point range.
The Lakers’ G League team, which has been eliminated from the playoffs, has three regular-season games remaining: Tuesday against Santa Cruz, Friday against Iowa and Saturday against Iowa.
LAKERS AT PACERS
When: Wednesday, 4:30 p.m. PT
Where: Gainbridge Fieldhouse, Indianapolis
TV/radio: ESPN, Spectrum SportsNet/710 AM