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The Lakers tonight put an end to their little mini-swoon, thrashing the Mavericks in Dallas, 109 to 93. One might've expected the purple and gold, less than 24 hours removed from a bitter loss to the Rockets, to be fighting some fatigue-related headwinds, but that was far from the case. The Lakers took the Mavs by their necks midway through the second quarter and just kept on squeezing until the final buzzer. It was a fine all-around performance but especially at the offensive end. Thanks in large part to the blistering shooting touch of Kobe Bryant (30 points) and Pau Gasol (27 points), the Lakers set season highs in effective field-goal percentage (64 percent), true shooting (66 percent) and points per possession (1.22).
The breakout star of the night was Ramon Sessions. He replaced a shaky Steve Blake with about five minutes left in the first quarter and the Lakers down 8 and immediately fuel-injected the attack. With Sessions accelerating the pace, slicing up the Mavs' defense off the dribble and finding open men exactly where they needed the rock, the game got turned on its ear. His creativity and intelligence infected the entire team, which played with a special verve when their new point guard was on the court. And he scored 17 points on eight shots to go with his nine assists and five boards. M-V-P!!! M-V-P!!! (Just kidding, Kobe, don't have me murdered.)
Speaking of Kobe, check out the video highlight after the jump. You'll enjoy it, I promise. More later on this FINE-ASS VICTORY.
Oh and some stats.
|
Poss. |
TO% |
FTA/ |
FT% |
3FGA/FGA |
2PT% |
3PT% |
EFG |
TS% |
OReb Rate |
DReb Rate |
PPP |
Lakers |
89 |
14 |
0.17 |
77 |
0.23 |
61 |
50 |
64 |
66 |
28 |
83 |
1.22 |
Mavs |
89 |
7 |
0.27 |
68 |
0.32 |
48 |
31 |
48 |
51 |
17 |
72 |
1.04 |
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