NBA

Just in: The Lakers’ NBA Cup victory indicates one thing: stars like LeBron and AD are essential.

967sportsof December 10, 2023

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LAS VEGAS — The NBA Cup is new, but the lesson it taught was as old as the league itself: To win anything of value — and the in-season tournament seems to have quickly established itself as such an event — you’re going to need superstars.

In a way, that the brilliant play of future Hall of Famers and champions LeBron James and Anthony Davis proved to be the deciding factor in the Los Angeles Lakers’ 123-109 victory over the Indiana Pacers to claim the first edition of the event verified its consequence.

Staged on a neutral floor in December in a single game, it was hard to truly compare Saturday night’s contest to any sort of playoff setting. But one thing was for certain: It was treated like an elimination game. There were aggressive game plans, heavy minutes and intensity — situations where James has thrived for a long time.

James is unquestionably one of the NBA’s greatest winner-take-all players in history. He has won nine such games in a row now, going back more than a decade. This isn’t an accident. He has averaged 33 points in those moments; that figure was slightly dragged down by only scoring 24 points, with 11 rebounds, on Saturday to finish off a tournament run that clinched him the first NBA Cup MVP award. (As an aside, that factoid might pave the way for the trophy being named after him someday.)

These games are not all created equal, of course. An NBA Finals Game 7, which James has won twice, isn’t the same as winning a game in the play-in tournament or the three tournament games this week.

James, though, has won the past five Game 7s he has played, with two of them coming on the road, one of the rarest feats to execute. The last time James lost a Game 7 was in 2008, when his Cleveland Cavaliers went down narrowly after he scored 45 points in Boston against the eventual champion Celtics.

This is why teams scheme, tamper, tank, and even pray to get their hands on a superstar like Davis, whose mega 41-point, 20-rebound game broke the undersized Pacers’ backs. It’s only been the Lakers’ game plan to group stars together for 50-some years, and it will be for the foreseeable future.

“We’ve been doing it together for a long time—five years now—and we just figured it out,” Davis said. “We know each other’s tendencies… We feed off one another. On Thursday, LeBron had it going, scoring 30 points in just 23 minutes in a blowout over the New Orleans Pelicans. “Tonight, it was me, and he still did his thing.”

The Lakers having two superstars is why, regardless of what their shortcomings might be from season to season, they remain such a threat. James has been on better teams; the Lakers won Saturday despite making just two 3-pointers because their shooting remains a problem. But all his trophies have come when he has had at least one future Hall of Famer at his side.

“We’ve played too many games together, shared too many moments together, and played in too many big moments together to fail each other,” James said of Davis. “It’s been everything, especially at the later stage of my career.”

Of course, they have fallen short. Notwithstanding the injuries, missing the playoffs the previous year was a complete bust. However, having to win the play-in tournament in order to get to the Western Conference finals the previous season served as a reminder of how important elite players are in an elimination format. Just like it was on Saturday evening. Role-player injuries have contributed to the Lakers’ early-season ups and downs, but this week was reminiscent of last spring.

In one of Austin Reaves’ greatest games of the season, he scored 28 points, mostly off the bench. Later in the season, Jarred Vanderbilt and Cam Reddish, two Lakers defenders, may have different stats. The Lakers had a brilliant game strategy as well, suffocating Tyrese Haliburton with double teams and exploiting the Pacers’ vulnerability in the paint defense by persistently pursuing shots and scoring 43 points in the lane.

One day, Haliburton may find itself on the other side of the superstar equation, but not right now. Having to deal with 26 double teams hindered him and prevented him from playing with the aggressiveness that elevates his game and unleashes the Pacers’ explosive attack.

Indiana’s performance in this tournament was reminiscent of the Phoenix Suns’ undefeated run in the 2020 Orlando, Florida, bubble. The Suns were in the Finals a year later, marking the start of a new era.

Not to get ahead of ourselves, but it seems like the Pacers are in a new chapter.

Even though Saturday’s victory isn’t included in the official regular-season rankings, all of these elements support the reality that, as long as James and Davis are fit and healthy, the NBA’s superstar concept is in effect.

Lakers coach Darvin Ham described their opponents as “a hell of a one-two punch, and that one or two could be either one of them on any given night.” “At the end of the day, they know how to take it to that next level when everything is on the line.”

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