MAking a statement?
Michael Madanat M'07 |
| Can Kobe help take the Lakers to another championship? |
It was no surprise to basketball fans when the Los Angeles Lakers, who with perhaps their best team since the 1980’s, opened the 2003-2004 season with a tremendous 18-3 run that included victories over many of the NBA’s best teams. To the satisfaction of critics and Lakers haters (i.e., Kings fans), however, the Lakers lost their momentum, and demonstrated a less than lackluster push to the All Star break when they stood with the fifth best record in the Western Conference. Why, with all of the hype of having four future Hall-of-Famers as starters, couldn’t the Lakers just get it together?
Of course, there was the re-ignited Shaq-Kobe feuding, a lack of team chemistry and a roster plagued with injuries (Shaq, Kobe, Malone, etc.) that contributed to the Lakers brief collapse, but the problem was arguably even more fundamental. Over the past 5 seasons (maybe with the exception of the 2000-2001 season), the Lakers have never been a particularly consistent team in the regular season. To the frustration of fans, despite ultimately being a winning team, the Lakers always manage to lose games that they should win and barely beat opponents that they should devastate. Sometimes they even surprise us when they blow out teams that they should struggle with, Sacramento and Minnesota being no exception.
Now here is a caveat: Expect this
playoff season to test every Western Conference team’s resolve. The
top six teams are all within five games of each other. No less, expect a
few surprises (the East beating the West not being one of them). The Lakers
at one point owned the best record in the NBA after the All Star break,
but are now in a bit of a slump having lost two of their last games at home.
We are yet to see who they match up with for the playoffs. However, with
all their stars healthy there is a sense that the Lakers may actually play
with some urgency and make a run at top seeding. Just remember that it is
arguably their inconsistency that makes the Lakers such an exciting team
to watch (believe that, unless you get off watching Spurs games), and that
while they may drop a couple here and there, their winning of the championship
this year should come as no surprise. After all, they have KOBE.