The Lakers spoiled what could have been an epic rivalry game with the Celtics

The Celtics smashed the Lakers on Monday night, but due to extenuating circumstances it doesn’t feel like a rivalry … yet.

The Boston Celtics crushed the Los Angeles Lakers last night. Really smacked them. They won 139-107 and it honestly didn’t even feel that close.

Five Celtics finished in double digits, and the whole team shot the lights out, going 55 percent from the field and 47 percent from deep. Anthony Davis — playing on a minutes restriction after coming back from a tailbone injury — got in foul trouble early and wasn’t much of a factor, finishing with 9 points on 3-for-7 shooting. LeBron James finished with just 15 points on 5-for-12 shooting. It was ugly from the Lakers, and the Celtics were red hot, and the game was a blowout.

For what was seemingly such a statement game — a young Celtics group smacking the LeBron-led Lakers, Kemba Walker finally beating James after 28 consecutive losses to his teams — I have to say it didn’t feel like much of an event.

Perhaps that was due to the Lakers, and notably their two biggest stars, no-showing. They looked tired and disinterested, and so despite the Celtics’ excellent play, the game never rose to anything beyond routine. It didn’t feel like Lakers vs. Celtics. It felt like a midseason NBA game.

This is the big issue with the Lakers, and one we’ve written about before. When LeBron and AD show up and play well, they look just about unstoppable. When either is hurt, or has an off night, or both have an off night (which happened on Monday), they can look like a lottery team.

The Lakers looked like a lottery team on Monday night, so the game didn’t feel special. We had a big Jaylen Brown dunk on LeBron and, other than that? Not much.

Hopefully, we’ll get there. These two teams are forever linked due to Kobe and Garnett and Pierce and [gestures broadly to the entire 1980s] but it’s just not there yet with these two groups. James and Davis are focused on their own team right now, and figuring out who among the roster can help them when it comes to playoff time. The Lakers are playing lots of guys and seeing who can hang, and unfortunately, not a ton of them are passing this test at the moment. Kyle Kuzma is so in his own head I want to give him a hug.

The Celtics, on the other hand, are finding their stride. They played just eight guys last night for most of the game, a shortened, playoff-style lineup. They wanted to see how they could do against the best and went full bore.

The Lakers treated it like a sparring session, so it felt like a sparring session. It’s a bummer for casual fans, who wanted to see a heavyweight fight, another chapter of a classic rivalry. But there’s just not enough history between these players yet, and the Lakers and Celtics are at such different parts of their seasons, it didn’t come together. Hopefully, next time, it will.

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