JJ Redick’s voice over the last two weeks has begun to gravel, the toll of screaming his way through basketball game after basketball game starting to wear on his vocal chords.
The yelling has been a necessity, the Lakers being a team that needs constant reminders of the points Redick and his coaching staff have tried to emphasize. And pregame Tuesday, Redick delivered the biggest point they wanted to make calmly.
“We have to play a smart game,” he said deliberately.
In their Monday night win in Charlotte, the Lakers certainly played hard. But after the first quarter, they rarely played smart, recklessly passing the ball all over the court. That couldn’t happen again — even with the 76ers playing minus Joel Embiid and Paul George.
The Lakers, Redick said, needed to play a smart game.
They did not and paid dearly, losing 118-104.
That calm quickly evaporated, Redick screaming at his team to run an “expletive play,” snatching the ball after calling a timeout and grabbing it like he was trying to squeeze all the air out of it.
LeBron James threw his hands up in the air after firing a pass well behind a cutting Rui Hachimura. Max Christie’s eyes went to the sky after a defensive miscommunication left him covering, on the same play, a player on the right block and the left corner. And Redick’s eyes locked onto the court as he shook his head, his team submerged under an avalanche of mistakes.
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The Lakers actually opened the game with energy and intention, quickly leading by nine points. But Bronny James Jr., playing because the Lakers were without Gabe Vincent for the second-straight game, had a rough shift on Tyrese Maxey, helping shift momentum. And then with two minutes to go in the first, Anthony Davis left the game holding his side. He didn’t return.
Without their best defender, Maxey cooked the Lakers’ defense, sprinting past whoever tried to cover him to either score or draw a foul. The team’s defense was so atrocious in the quarter that the Lakers shot 70.6% from the field and were still outscored 48-32 in the second.
Philadelphia shot 16 free throws in the second quarter alone, Dorian Finney-Smith picking up three of his four first-half fouls in the quarter. The Lakers also were without Jarred Vanderbilt, the team electing to hold him out on the second night of a back-to-back after he missed the first 42 games of the year.
The Lakers turned the ball over 22 times and trailed by as many as 25. James had eight of those turnovers, though he scored 31 points.
Rookie Dalton Knecht had 24 off the bench.
Maxey led everyone with 43 points, the 76ers having now beaten the Lakers seven straight times in Philadelphia by an average of 18.3 points.
The Lakers play again Thursday in Washington against the Wizards.
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This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
