LOS ANGELES — Almost every defense has the same goal: cut off the head of the snake.
But what if you don’t know where the head is?
The Utah Jazz are now a team bereft of star power, but with plenty of competence. Is the head Jordan Clarkson, the former Laker with a playground rhythm? Is it Lauri Markkanen, the tall Finnish jump shooter? Is it Mike Conley, the veteran table-setter? Or is it Collin Sexton off the bench, with furious drives into the paint?
If there is an answer, the Lakers never figured it out on Friday night, falling 130-116 to the surprising Jazz (7-3) and dropping to 2-6 themselves. After back-to-back wins, it was a tough comedown against a team that many believed was rebuilding.
The Lakers’ own stars finished with respectable numbers, but notably none of their best moments seemed to quite sync, and none found a way to take over the end of the game. LeBron James had 17 points, 11 rebounds and eight assists, but his 7-for-19 mark from the field left a lot on the table. Anthony Davis started fast, going 8 for 13 from the field, but he scored just two points after halftime.
The most impressive of the trio was Russell Westbrook, who had 28 points on 9-for-14 shooting and added six assists.
But the Jazz got big turns from Markkanen (27 points), Clarkson (20), Sexton (17) and Kelly Olynyk (18). Conley was active at the end, nailing a key clock-beating 3-pointer then driving past Westbrook on back-to-back possessions. Utah led by as much as 16 points and never trailed.
The Lakers – who have leaned on defense – saw the Jazz shoot 50.5% overall, going 17 for 40 (42.5%) from behind the arc.
The third quarter was the most scintillating, as Westbrook helped close the deficit with an 11-2 run that featured him hitting a 3-pointer, finishing a difficult layup on a half-court pass from Austin Reaves, and throwing out to a wide-open Lonnie Walker IV in transition after a steal.
At one point as Westbrook sank a pair of free throws, the previously unthinkable happened: The home arena started to chant, “M-V-P” for a player who has had fans gasping whenever he pulled up for a jump shot.
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The 33-year-old former MVP has looked tremendous since being moved to sixth man, averaging 19.5 points, 4.8 assists and shooting 50.1% overall. His 28 points were a career high off the bench – hardly a surprise since the last season he came off the bench was as a rookie.
From the start, Coach Darvin Ham warned of how tricky it would be to defend a Utah team that doesn’t rely on any one player to score, comparing them to some of the balanced Atlanta Hawks teams he was an assistant coach for. The Jazz’s ball movement certainly made them vexing to the Lakers: After one quarter alone, they had racked up 11 assists.
Their passing got them easy baskets inside for Markkanen and Kelly Olynyk, but the real trouble started when Clarkson and Sexton began to hit from the outside. By halftime, the Jazz had racked up 75 points – the most any of the Lakers’ opponents (including the reigning champion Golden State Warriors) had scored on them in a half. Utah shot 60.8% from the field in the first half.
A slow start from James didn’t help matters – the 37-year-old missed his first four shots from the field and had just six points at halftime. But Davis and Westbrook filled in, with Davis piling up 20 points in the first half and Westbrook adding 14 by halftime.
More to come on this story.