Heading into Saturday night, it felt like the Los Angeles Lakers were in for a trap game against the New Orleans Pelicans. Given how absurdly injured New Orleans is, head coach JJ Redick had to make sure his team came out with the right mindset.
However, things did not go that way as the Pelicans were simply outworking L.A. in the first half, especially on the offensive glass. There was a lot of ball watching and lack of boxing out, which led to trailing by as many as 15 in the second quarter.
Thankfully, the Lakers cleaned that up in the second half by limiting New Orleans to one shot and despite having limited fire power, the purple and gold got back into the game and eventually came away with the win.