After suffering a disappointing home loss to the Charlotte Hornets on Wednesday in their first post-All-Star break game, the Los Angeles Lakers are searching for answers. Since the addition of Luka Doncic into the starting lineup, the Lakers are 1-2, the back-to-back losses coming against bottomfeeders Utah and Charlotte.
There are certainly extenuating circumstances. Doncic just came back from a long absence and is still playing himself into shape. The Lakers lost their only starting-caliber center and didn't replace him at the trade deadline. The growing pains are to be expected.
At the same time, it's obvious that Doncic has made a few of Lakers' existing woes worse. The biggest of them is the perimeter defense.
Hornets strategy at the end of the game was to target Luka on defense every time pic.twitter.com/1bhAVUQzvG
— LakeShowYo (@LakeShowYo) February 20, 2025
Luka Doncic's Defensive Struggles Proved to Be Costly Against the Hornets
Doncic is clearly not at 100% in terms of conditioning. While he has struggled on the offensive side as well, this is painfully obvious defensively. Against Charlotte, he was targeted relentlessly by the Hornets guards, most notably LaMelo Ball.
This came on the heels of a Jazz game before the All-Star break in which the Lakers gave up a miserable 132.3 points per 100 possessions.
The new version of the Lakers doesn't have a defensive anchor like Anthony Davis. There isn't a rim protector in the backline who can clean up the mess defensively. This means that the perimeter defense needs to be less porous. Doncic, James, and Austin Reaves all have to do a better job keeping their players in front of them.
Perhaps the Lakers will be such a deadly offense that these defensive shortcomings will not matter much. In Doncic's current state, that has not been the case so far. JJ Redick has 29 games left in the season to figure things out and put lineups that work on both ends of the floor for the playoffs.