Flagg Drops 45, Mavericks Overwhelm Short Handed Lakers 134-128

Written By Malcolm Xavier of The Lakers Room

Luke Kennard collected his first triple-double of his career with 13 points 15 rebounds and 11 assist. Good news on a bad night. Cooper Flagg jumped out with 19 points of his eventual 45 point 8 rebound and 9 assist masterpiece in the first quarter alone, where the Mavericks scored 41 points on the Lakers overall. I guess it's progress - we gave up 44 to Oklahoma city. I'm joking. I'm not sure if the Lakers ever led in this game although LeBron James and company did their best to try to make it interesting minus their two top scorers. LeBron led LA with a near triple double himself with 30 points 15 assist and 9 rebounds and looked everything like King James in the losing effort.

Dallas started the second half with another 40 point blitz in the 3rd quarter. LA got the score to 5 with about 7 minutes left in the fourth on a Bronny James three pointer that cut the score to 112-107 leading to a Dallas timeout, after trailing by double digits on multiple occasions. Dallas got the lead back to double digits after the timeout at 121-111 with 5 minutes remaining. LA responded with a 5-0 run stamped by a James to Hayes (who added 21 off the bench) alley oop to get the score back to 121-116 with 4:22 left in the game and that's the closest things would get. Dallas won 131-123 on the first night since the Lakers lost Doncic and Reaves. The third seed might get slipper, LA faces OKC again on Tuesday at Crypto.