The Los Angeles Lakers came into Staples Center with a lot on their minds. A three-game losing streak that included two blowouts to the Golden State Warriors and the Minnesota Timberwolves was bad enough, but plenty of other things were going on that wasn’t needed.
Luke Walton’s job security was brought up for the 734th time this season with reports of LeBron James’ camp “preferring a coaching change”.
If that wasn’t enough, it looked like the Lakers would not even have enough firepower with Kyle Kuzma having to sit out with a nagging hip injury that had him stiff in the loss to the Timberwolves.