The Los Angeles Lakers saw their season end at the hands of the Denver Nuggets for the second straight year, this time in the first round rather than the Conference Finals. In the 2024 edition, the Lakers lost in five games, with two of their losses coming on Jamal Murray game-winners in the final seconds.
L.A. led for the vast majority of the series, holding double-digit leads in all five games, but could not execute well enough down the stretch to take down the defending champs. The Timberwolves are currently showing what is required to beat the Nuggets, as they’ve mown down the champs in back-to-back impressive performances, and look to be on the precipice of bouncing Denver from the second round.
That effort only adds to the frustration for the Lakers, as it’s very apparent this year’s Nuggets team is more gettable — if you can put together a full 48. That was something Los Angeles just could not manage to do, and now they enter an offseason with some fascinating decisions to make, starting with a head coaching change.
LeBron James also has a decision to make, as he can test the free agency waters, and the 39-year-old knows chances to get one more ring are running low. With that in mind, James spoke about the Lakers loss on this week’s “Mind the Game” podcast with noted Lakers coaching candidate JJ Redick, saying “sh*t hurts” but also admitting “the better team won” even with the opportunities L.A. had.
.@KingJames reflects on the Lakers playoff exit and gives credit where credit is due.
Episode 7 of Mind the Game with LeBron and @jj_redick is now live: https://t.co/PZEPZ7YtS3 pic.twitter.com/c0tL7hkPfV
— Mind the Game (@mindthegamepod) May 8, 2024
What will be interesting is how the Lakers go about trying to be the better team next year. They got a lot of healthy games from LeBron and Anthony Davis this year, but the supporting cast continued to lag behind what they needed. Given the incredible depth of the top contenders in the West, particularly Minnesota and Oklahoma City, the Lakers need to figure out how to increase their talent level around James and AD at numerous spots. That’s not going to be easy, and even though they came close to beating Denver (even in a five-game series), it’s pretty clear there’s more work to do than just making marginal improvements if they want to be in title contention again.