LaMarcus Aldridge’s dirty unfortunate closeout on Brandon Ingram five minutes into the game left the Lakers without their best wing defender, against a team that possesses unusual size at those positions. Rudy Gay always torches Kyle Kuzma and last night was no different, while DeMar DeRozan is just too big and skilled for the contests of Josh Hart or Kentavious Caldwell-Pope to bother him.
Luke Walton said that Kuzma had been wanting to defend DeRozan the whole night, and he got his wish in the fourth quarter, demonstrating more of his improved perimeter defense than he did against Gay.