Lakers vs. Nets Game Preview: Where’s Brooklyn at?

The Los Angeles Lakers and their seven-game losing streak begin their East coast tour with a stop in Brooklyn to face the Nets. These two teams faced off earlier in the season, with the Lakers eking out a win over a Nets team that fought till the bitter end.

The Sacramento Kings absolutely crushed the Lakers on Monday, unleashing a third-quarter flurry that felt like the fury of the previous two losing seasons condensed into an astonishing 12 minutes. The team is now on an ever-expanding losing streak and coming off of one of their most deflating games of the year. Responding on the road won’t be easy, especially with the Nets bringing Jeremy Lin back into the fold following a hamstring injury.

Brook Lopez is the player to watch, though, as the purple and gold seemingly have absolutely no answer for big men who can score. Kristaps Porzingis and DeMarcus Cousins are only the two most recent bigs who’ve feasted on the Lakers’ lack of interior resistance, and while Lopez may not be a young All-Star type talent, he can still get buckets. Case in point: he dropped 30 on the Lakers last time around.

The sooner the Lakers can snap out of this funk and get back to playing respectable basketball, the better. The ugly losses are becoming all too painstakingly familiar, and quite frankly this team is better than that. They know it, too, it’s just a matter of showing it. Dropping another one, this time to a six-win team, would be brutal.

Time: 4:30 p.m. PT

TV: Spectrum SportsNet