The Los Angeles Lakers suffered a difficult and disappointing 114-109 loss to the New York Knicks on Monday. It was the type of game in which the Lakers never seemed to have any real flow or rhythm offensively.
The Knicks dictated a slow tempo for much of the evening, and Los Angeles had plenty of trouble getting shots to fall, both in the paint and from the outside. It shot 42.4% overall and 31.7% from 3-point range, and in the second half, it made a frigid 22.2% of its 3-point attempts.
The team’s offense looked slow and mechanical for much of the game, especially when its running game was shut down after halftime. But head coach Darvin Ham believed the Lakers had good enough looks offensively to win.
Darvin Ham on tonight's Lakers shooting: "It's a game of runs. All the looks we got tonight, I'll take them every day of the week and twice on Sundays. You just got to continue being aggressive." pic.twitter.com/fYPWxBbe3r
— Spectrum SportsNet (@SpectrumSN) December 19, 2023
The Lakers’ problems with their 3-point shooting have been well documented. With this loss, they have fallen to 24th in 3-point shooting accuracy, and they’re 28th in 3-point attempts per game.
On the other hand, they’re sixth in free-throw attempts per game, sixth in fast-break points per game, fifth in overall field goal percentage and fifth in points in the paint per game. If L.A. simply finds a way to become an average 3-point shooting team, both in terms of accuracy and volume, it would climb from 24th in offensive rating to a significantly higher ranking in that category.