By Mykell Mathieu
LeBron James scored 25 points to help the Lakers hold on and defeat their hallway rival, Clippers, 106-103 ending their 4-game losing skid on Sunday night.
James had a great all-around game for the Lakers including a big time poster dunk over the Clippers’ Paul George in the third quarter. He added eight rebounds and seven assists along with leading the purple & gold in scoring.
Lakers forward Anthony Davis added 22 points and 10 rebounds for the Lakers, who beat the rising Clippers for the second straight time after losing 11 in a row to them.
Lakers forward Taurean Prince and guard D’Angelo Russell made some key plays down the stretch to help the “home’ team secure the victory.
“We played like we needed to win, like it was a must-win,” Davis said. “We competed on both sides of the basketball. We’ve just got to build off of it. We know what we have in the locker room. We know what it takes to win, and we displayed that tonight.”
George and Zubac were the leading scores for the Clippers as they finished with 22 points a piece. Zubac was able to add an astounding 19 rebounds in the losing effort.
Clippers guard James Harden was playing in his first game as a Clipper against his favorite childhood team, the Lakers. Harden finished the game 15 points and nine assists.
Even with the loss, the Clippers have won 14 of 17 games.
“There was a bad flow to the game offensively,” Clippers coach Tyronn Lue said. “I thought our defense was pretty good, but offensively we couldn’t get in a flow or a rhythm.”
Kawhi Leonard who has played well during the last 17 games stretch for the Clippers had one of his worst performances of his season on Sunday night. He finished with only 15 points shooting six for 17 from the field.
“You’re going to have games like this (where) you’re not going to play great,” Leonard said.
The Clippers have a quick turnaround as they are back at it tonight at home against the Phoenix Suns. The Lakers host the Toronto Raptors on Tuesday night.
