After getting a big win over the L.A. Clippers, the Los Angeles Lakers played at home against the Toronto Raptors on Tuesday night, hoping to keep their winning streak going.
With a win, the Lakers got back to even with the season, and they did just that, holding on for a 132-131 win.
The Raptors took an early 9–5 lead before Cam Reddish finally made a three-pointer. Anthony Davis scored the first five points for the Lakers, but no one else scored a point.
Davis kept working hard down low early on against a Raptors team that was missing starting center Jakob Poeltl. Then Christian Wood came in and did something right away, scoring five straight points for L.A.
The Lakers were ahead 28–24 at the end of the first quarter after Davis and Dennis Schroder, a former Laker, traded three-pointers.
At the start of the second, D’Angelo Russell made a 3-pointer, but after that, both teams stopped scoring. LeBron James didn’t score until the middle of the second quarter when he went to the basket and made a three-point play. James then made a deep shot from the logo that gave L.A. an eight-point lead.
Once the Raptors added R.J. Barrett and Immanuel Quickley, they did a great job on offense and took a 53-51 lead into the break.
At the start of the third quarter, the Lakers were sloppy with the ball, which let the Raptors score a triple that made their lead seven points. From there, Reddish and Taurean Prince answered with their triples, which were very helpful because Quickley then made back-to-back shots from deep.
Then James made a nice comeback with back-to-back layups and a three-point play. Prince then made another three to get the Lakers within two points and force a Raptors timeout.
After that, Max Christie and Russell hit threes, and then Jarred Vanderbilt and Russell scored in the fast break to put the Lakers ahead 84–78. But Schroder led the Raptors to a strong end to the third quarter, which gave them a narrow 89-88 lead going into the fourth.
To start the fourth quarter, Wood made two big three-point shots that gave the Lakers the lead again. Davis got back on track offensively, though, and James made a three-pointer to tie the game at 105. This kept things close.
Quickley hurt his team in the end by making some bad calls, including a flagrant foul out of the game. As a result, the Lakers took the lead again, and Austin Reaves finally scored after having a slow start to the night.
The Raptors fought back, but at the last minute, they were down by one point. Davis saved the day for L.A., though, with a block and then two free throws. The Raptors then gave the ball away, which let the Lakers hold on for the win.
Toronto made some shots and played the foul game late to stay in the game, but Davis made some big free throws to seal the deal.