A team doesn’t fall behind by nearly 30 points in a playoff game without a whole host of things going wrong. From an X’s and O’s standpoint, the Lakers were outclassed by the Wolves on both ends of the floor.
But tactics alone did not account for the whole deficit in Saturday’s loss. After the game, the prevailing message relayed by the Lakers, from head coach JJ Redick to each and every player, was the need to be more physical moving forward in the series.
“I think they just physically beat us from the get-go,” Austin Reaves said. “Neither team has played in a week or so, but they came out with a little more aggression and physicality to their game that helped them win tonight.”
Both metaphorically and literally, Minnesota punched the Lakers in the mouth in Game 1. By the time LA took their blows and adjusted, they were facing a hole too deep to climb out of.
I think the first quarter, we played the way we play,” Luka Dončić said. “I think we were playing physical. Everybody was locked in. And then we kind of let go of the rope. We got to be way more physical. It’s 48 minutes and every possession matters.”
The second and third quarters were where the Wolves really asserted their will, opening up a 27-point lead. Eventually, the Lakers answered the intensity and physicality and made a run to close the third period and open the fourth, trimming the lead all the way down to 12 points.
Met the intensity that they were bringing to the table,” LeBron James said of the second-half run. “We met the physicality and started to get up into them. Allowed us get some turnovers, get some extra possessions and it allowed us to get back into the game. Sometimes it takes a quarter, two quarters, a full game to get used to playoff basketball once again. So it shouldn’t be no surprise on Tuesday.
Tuesday, as LeBron noted, becomes a critical game for the Lakers. And coming out with the right mindset and approach the game will go just as far in determining the winner as any tactical changes might.
“I think we got to be aggressive,” Jarred Vanderbilt said. “I feel like they hit us first and they was the more physical team for majority their game. We tried to pick it up late in the second half and through the fourth, but when you’re facing that deficit, it’s kind of hard to overcome.
