LOS ANGELES — The New Year’s Eve game in downtown Los Angeles had multiple levels of anticipation.
The Cleveland Cavaliers were visiting the Lakers, bringing with them a league-best 28-4 record while also arriving on the second night of a road back-to-back, having vanquished the Golden State Warriors on Monday.
There was LeBron James after five days of rest and having just turned 40 years old on Monday.
And there were the debuts of two new Lakers, power forward Dorian Finney-Smith and point guard Shake Milton after the two were acquired from the Brooklyn Nets on Sunday in exchange for point guard D’Angelo Russell, small forward Maxwell Lewis and three second-round picks.
The Cavaliers overcame the significant rest disadvantage and defeated the Lakers 122-110 behind the power of 18 3s (out of 46 attempts) while adding a season-high 24 second-chance points. Cavaliers shooting guard Donovan Mitchell led the 3-point assault, making 6-of-13 3s as part of a 26-point performance, while center Jarrett Allen added 27 points (12-of-14 field goals) and 14 rebounds. Reserve forward Max Strus came off the bench to score 15 points, making 4-of-8 3s.
The way the Cavaliers outplayed the Lakers was highlighted by three key areas: 3-point shooting, second-chance points and bench scoring. The Lakers only made 9-of-35 3s, a 25.7 percent mark. The Cavaliers outscored the Lakers by 12 points on second-chance opportunities, emphasizing the Lakers’ problems containing the defensive glass. And the Lakers bench that was refreshed by Finney-Smith and Milton had only 12 points total, as Strus outscored the Lakers reserves by himself.
“They have some really good shotmakers on their team,” said Lakers head coach JJ Redick after the Cavaliers reached 120 points for the 18th time this season. “Overall, our defense in terms of execution, physicality, intensity, was good. It’s funny, you think about some of those 3s they made and some of the 3s we missed — they were obviously able to generate 11 more — but the difference in the game, if you’re going to have that level of disparity from the 3-point line, the only way to really counteract that is to get a really high amount of free-throw attempts and them have no free-throw attempts. And we didn’t get that tonight.”
Finney-Smith’s first action for the Lakers came when he subbed in for Rui Hachimura with 6:52 left in the first quarter, placing him with the rest of a Lakers starting lineup that included James, Anthony Davis, Austin Reaves, and Max Christie. The first defensive possession Finney-Smith had was a foul that put Allen on the free-throw line, part of a first quarter where the Cavaliers made 11-of-13 free throws. For the rest of the game, the Cavaliers only made 3-of-4 free throws, but the Lakers only made 17-of-19 free throws for the entire game.
It wasn’t all bad for Finney-Smith. His first basket came after Davis tried to draw a foul in the midrange on Allen. Davis’ attempt drew nothing but air, but Finney-Smith surprised backup Cavaliers center Georges Niang with an athletic follow dunk as the Lakers fought to make up a 15-point first-quarter deficit.
“I ain’t really know no plays at all,” said Finney-Smith, who finished Tuesday’s game with just the two points on 1-of-4 shooting while missing both 3s and grabbing two rebounds (both offensive) in 20:24. “Everybody was talking to me and helping me throughout the game. I was limited on minutes, but I just tried to have an immediate impact and do what coach asked me to do: be me, you know. Be a dog on defense, talk and bring energy. That’s all I try to do. I got two open looks. But like A.D. been telling me, going to get more of those.”
Finney-Smith will be relied on to guard up with the Lakers. Before the game, Redick described multi-positional defenders as having what “some people call it the dog mentality … I heard.” Redick believes that Finney-Smith fits into that group, and it showed when Redick chose not to play backup center Jaxson Hayes or activate two-way contract center Christian Koloko against the Cavaliers to spread Cleveland out when either Allen or power forward Evan Mobley were off the floor.
“You got to want to play defense, and you got to take a lot of pride in it,” Redick said before Tuesday’s game. “It’s not easy, you know, to be able to guard primary ball handlers, wing creators, and five-men. It’s real challenging. The guys that can do it, and I think Dorian’s one of those guys, (Jarred Vanderbilt) is one of those guys. It’s a special skill and a special talent in this league.”
Perhaps Finney-Smith’s best sequence was in the third quarter when the Lakers found themselves down by 12 again after erasing the 15-point first-quarter deficit in the second quarter. Mobley rolled and received a pass going down the middle from point guard Darius Garland out of a timeout. Finney-Smith made sure to collapse onto Mobley with the threat of a pass out to Dean Wade gone, and Mobley coughed it up, with the loose ball allowing Reaves to start a fast break.
“I may start on the main guy, but we got people we can switch with: Rui, LeBron, and A.D.,” said Finney-Smith, who was the only Laker to have a positive plus-minus (plus-seven) in his minutes Tuesday night. “We all can switch. So we can help each other. But they made tough shots. They made a bunch of 3s, and we didn’t.”
Ironically, Milton came in and did a decent job shooting the basketball. He made his first look, a corner 3 in the first quarter that came off of a Davis miss that Dalton Knecht rebounded. And in the third quarter, Milton was out there again splashing a left corner 3, this time on a fast break pass from James that cut Cleveland’s lead to one.
Ultimately, it doesn’t matter who Finney-Smith guards if the rest of the Lakers can’t be assignment sound on shooters or get shooting fortune defensively.
The very next possession after Milton’s 3, Niang rebounded a Mobley missed 3 to set up a second-chance scoring opportunity for the Cavaliers. Finney-Smith was on Mitchell as the ball found backup Cavaliers wing Caris LeVert. Knecht helped off of Mobley to help James defend LeVert, causing Davis to defend Mobley. LeVert kicked to Niang in the corner, forcing Finney-Smith to close out hard and leave Mitchell wide open. Niang hit Mitchell on a swing pass for an easy catch-and-shoot 3, generating an 8-0 run to close the third quarter; the Lakers trailed by at least five points for the entire fourth quarter.
Even when the Lakers got some life in the building in the fourth quarter, with a 7-0 run capped by an audacious James corner 3 to bring the Cavaliers’ lead down to 112-107 with 2:50 left to play, the Lakers just weren’t sturdy enough inside. Allen went on a personal 6-0 run to shut the door on the Lakers for good, and he punctuated the run by rebounding what should have been a break for the Lakers on a 3-pointer that Mitchell missed badly; instead, Allen scooped up the carom and finished the possession with a score.
James finished the game with 23 points on 9-of-17 shooting in 34 minutes, his first game as a 40-year-old; he did not address the media Tuesday night. Davis had 28 points on 12-of-23 shooting. Reaves tied his career high with 35 points while adding 10 assists in 38 minutes. The rest of the Lakers had only 24 points on 10-of-35 shooting (28.6 percent) from the field and 3-of-21 3s (14.3 percent).
Despite the lack of shotmaking, shot creation and rebounding from the non-stars, the Lakers insist they’re in a good place. They are 18-14, which is good for 7th in the Western Conference. Now, they will focus on integrating Finney-Smith and Milton, who got an opportunity with Gabe Vincent out due to an oblique strain.
“We’re trending in the right direction,” Davis said after the game. “Tonight was a good night for us. We missed a lot of shots, wide-open looks that we missed. We make half of those, it’s a different game. So I like where our ball club is. Obviously, we had some new additions with Doe-Doe and Shake. We’re going to be able to get some practice time to get them more acclimated with what we do and try to fit it into our system. I liked the looks that they got tonight.”
(Photo of Donovan Mitchell guarding Dorian Finney-Smith: Gary A. Vasquez / Imagn Images
