Los Angeles Lakers: 3 things the Lakers need to do to take care of business

2. Defense, anyone?

To mention defense prior to the series’ onset would immediately shift the focus of most to Portland’s tremendous shortcomings on that side of the ball.

And tremendous may be the understatement of the year.

The Los Angeles Lakers were downright awful when it came to slowing down opposing offensive brigades before NBA bubble competition began, but the birth of the second half of the season unearthed a Portland defense unbeknownst to the outside world prior to the league’s closure.

Their transformation was “Extreme Makeover” worthy, and they made a gymnast’s vault from dead last in the NBA in total defensive rating to the top spot in the category amongst playoff opposers after Game 1.

The Lakers’ trend, however, went the exact opposite.

They ranked third in the league per the same metric from October through March but were rendered missing in action upon the league’s restart, dropping to a mediocre 12 position through a 3-5 five slide to close the cap of the season.

Now, we all know the lethality that Damian Lillard possesses from just about anywhere on the court once he crosses the half-court line.

He was a loaded Predator missile waiting to strike, and his presence as an offensive weapon was obvious, as was the shriveled look of terror that struck the eyes of LA’s guards as they slipped underneath of a hard screen, or the fear that embellished big men forced to take on unwanted defensive duties as the result of a miscued switch.

But Lillard’s bombastic 3-pointers weren’t the only thing that disheveled Frank Vogel’s attempts to slow up Portland’s scoring efforts. In fact, Lillard was potent from both mid and inside range. LA’s efforts to run him off of the 3-point line proved dangerous in their own way, backfiring to open up several truck-sized lanes for him to the rim, and forcing weak side help that gave Lillard the option for an easy layup, or a timely kick out to one of his fellow marksmen.

CJ McCollum was an absolute problem in isolation (he’s boasting a 71.4 percent scoring frequency in one-on-one’s during the playoffs), and for all the Blazers gave up on the defensive end in replacing Trevor Ariza and Al-Farouq Aminu with Carmelo Anthony, he’s opened up the floor in an insurmountable way, forcing bigs like Anthony Davis out to the perimeter to contest his more-than efficient outside stroke.

On paper, the Los Angeles Lakers held a sizable advantage over Portland on both sides of the ball throughout the regular season tilt. But Dame Time is apparently all the time, and his troupe had LA scrambling like eggs to keep pace in the teams’ first face-off.