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In one of the most obvious Christmas Day games ever due to the excitement around both new-look, hopefully healthy contenders, the Los Angeles Lakers will be taking on the Brooklyn Nets as part of the NBA’s annual holiday showcase.
Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN broke the news four hours before the league was set to announce the schedule on “The Jump.”
Plenty of discuss on The Jump at 3 PM ET today with unveiling of Christmas Day games, including, sources say: Trae Young and Atlanta Hawks returning to play the New York Knicks at MSG. Plus, battle of the East-West titans: The Brooklyn Nets vs. the Los Angeles Lakers at Staples.
— Adrian Wojnarowski (@wojespn) August 17, 2021
Nets-Lakers on Christmas day
— Bleacher Report (@BleacherReport) August 17, 2021
(via @wojespn) pic.twitter.com/7gHNIOG9I7
Nets-Lakers on Christmas day
— Silver Screen and Roll (@LakersSBN) August 17, 2021
(via @wojespn)https://t.co/wn6I35T8Zn pic.twitter.com/LKHVOVnAE7
As I referenced above, Lakers-Nets was a pretty obvious pick. Between the storylines — Russell Westbrook vs. Kevin Durant! James Harden vs. Russ! LeBron James vs. Kyrie Irving! LeBron vs. KD! — and the fact that there is a great deal of excitement and curiosity about how this year’s two title favorites will match up, there is a lot to look forward to about these two teams taking each other on. And Christmas Day is always a showcase for the biggest teams and best on-paper matchups, so this game certainly fits the bill and then some.
To illustrated this, there isn’t a whole lot we agree on in the Silver Screen and Roll Slack — Anthony Irwin is in there, after all — but yesterday when we discussed possible Christmas Day matchups, this was a nearly unanimous prediction. It’s also pretty hard not to be excited about it. In addition to the scintillating storylines, this should be a truly fascinating and excellent basketball game as long as both teams are healthy for it.
Can the Lakers muster up enough defense to stop the Nets’ Big 3? Can the relatively undersized Nets do anything to stop the Lakers’ bigger, stronger and faster star trio from getting to the rim at will? This could be a potential NBA Finals preview, and it will be really fun to see how these basketball questions and more start to play out on the court.
The NBA will reveal the rest of the schedule for the Lakers, Nets and the other 28 teams in the league on ESPN’s “The Jump” at 12 p.m. PT. Stay tuned to Silver Screen and Roll for more updates.
For more Lakers talk, subscribe to the Silver Screen and Roll podcast feed on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher or Google Podcasts. You can follow Harrison on Twitter at @hmfaigen.