What we learned as fighters can’t stop the advertisement in loss to Lakers

What we learned as fighters can’t stop the advertisement in loss to Lakers originally appeared on NBC Sports Bay Area

Box score

San Francisco-there are levels for regular seasonal matches in the NBA. Some deserve more hype than others. The weight is heavier and the atmosphere suggests something more than just another game with many more to follow.

Saturday night at the Chase Center fell in this category. It fits the bill. The reason is obvious and everyone knows it. While Warriors welcomed Los Angeles Lakers into their home for the second time this season was all eyes on Steph Curry and LeBron James.

For the second time this season, James and Lakers got the best of Curry and Warriors at Golden State’s Home Court, 118-108.

Curry scored only 13 points, 25 fewer than when these teams played each other a month ago. He was 4 out of 17 overall from the field and 2 of 9 on 3-Pointers, and fell an assist with a double-double with nine dimes.

James had a 25-point, 12-assist-double-double as the 40-year-old continues to defy speed, but his teammate had the most dominant view of everyone. Anthony Davis gave Golden State’s Defense 36 points and 13 rebounds. In short, Davis was a strength to be counted onAnd Warriors couldn’t do anything to slow him down.

Andrew Wiggins led Warriors in the scoring by adding 20 points, and Brandin Podziemski’s 17 points were his third most this season.

Warriors and Lakers face each other twice this season and both games are in LA.

Here are three takeaways from Warriors’ loss to Lakers.

Bragging rights between basketball gods

The long one Curry and James History has become well chronic. They met in four consecutive NBA finals with Curry and Warriors, topping James and Cleveland Cavaliers three times. In the regular season, the two legends are now squared into 25 games against each other.

Entry Saturday night had each beaten each other 12 times in the regular season. Now James has upper hand with 13 wins.

Each had strong performances from the first half. Curry put 13 points on 4-of-9 shooting along with five assists. James also had 11 points and five assists. But Curry was held scoreless in the third quarter, missing out on all three of his shooting attempts, while James added another four points to give him 15 go into the fourth.

James then used his strength to score six quick points to open the fourth quarter and spoke 10 in the final frame. Curry couldn’t score in the fourth quarter.

Podz vs. Schröder -debatten

There were stretches in the first half where Dennis Schröder looked like the player Warriors cooked as a member of Brooklyn Nets earlier this season. He zoomed in to the hole for a layup and then followed by draining a 3-pointer in the first quarter. Schroder came to midrange in the second quarter and had 10 points in the first half.

And then he disappeared. Instead of letting him run the show when Curry was on the bench, Schröder continued to look like a clumsy fit for Warriors. Podziemski was the opposite.

When he played his second game since he was missing 12 directly into a belly injury, Podziemski again looked like the version that was Warriors’ most effective rookie since Daymond Green.

Schröder was scoreless in the second half, and Podziemski was a big difference producer, which is why Kerr chose to close with him over the veteran. In the last two games, Podziemski has now scored 27 points and has gone 5 out of 11 behind the 3-point line.

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For most of the Christmas day, a big piece was missing on the field when Warriors lost to Lakers in the last second. Davis played only seven minutes after leaving early injured. He did not register any points and had only two rebounds in his short time spent on the floor.

This time it was a very different story.

Warriors had no answer to Star Big Man Saturday. Davis had eight points and four rebounds in the first quarter, then added 10 points and five more rebounds in the second, which brought him to 18 points and nine rebounds at the break.

Another eight points and three more rebounds brought Davis to 26 points and 12 rebounds through three quarters. To put a stamp on his spectacular show, Davis scored 10 more points in the fourth quarter and grabbed his 13th rebound.

Far and away was Warriors’ best center Rookie Quinten Post. Trayce Jackson-Davis started, but played only 14 minutes. He was a minus-2 with four points and six rebounds. Kevon Looney was a minus-10 in 10 minutes from the bench, not scoring a single point to go by two points.

However, Post played the most important minutes of the game and ended as a plus-1 with eight points against his toughest competition so far in his short NBA career.

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