NEW YORK — Josh Hart was sprinting up the floor, a Knicks teammate flanked to his right and another spotting up on the left wing. He saw a confused set of Lakers opponents in front of him, seemingly pointing at one another instead of trying to stop him. So he kept driving.
When Hart gathered for a left-handed layup, the Lakers appeared on the verge of another transition defense breakdown in a season full of them.
Then Anthony Davis sprang into action.
As Hart took off, the Lakers’ All-Star big man instinctively crouched, leaving his own assignment to address the threat at the rim. He spun around, leaped and swatted Hart’s attempt with his left hand, saving a sure bucket.
It wasn’t quite enough. The ball tipped back to Knicks star Jalen Brunson, who took a power dribble and attacked the open rim again. So Davis, momentarily out of the fray, swiftly crouched again. As the Knicks’ southpaw switched to his right hand, Davis jumped to Brunson’s outside shoulder. The 6-11 Lakers big man spun his body again and swung down with his own right hand, erasing Brunson’s shot emphatically, too.
The sequence ignited a Lakers fast break that turned into a four-point swing. It was emblematic of the effort Davis and the rest of the Lakers showed on this night – and haven’t shown consistently this season.
“Putting my imprint on the game,” Davis said of his back-to-back blocks. “Protecting the rim. Instincts. That’s what I do. It wasn’t like I’ve never done that before. It’s just a natural instinct that I have: see a ball at the rim, go get it.
“I’m just trying to make plays. Shot wasn’t there offensively, I tried to leave my imprint on the game on the defensive end.”
Led by Davis and LeBron James, who scored 24 points while putting on a Broadway-caliber show in the arena he deemed “the Mecca of basketball” earlier in the day, the Lakers defeated the red-hot New York Knicks 113-105 at Madison Square Garden in a Saturday night showcase matchup. In snapping the Knicks’ nine-game winning streak, the Lakers improved to 26-25 and 3-2 on their six-game road trip. They have now won four of six games, including road victories over the league-leading Celtics (without James and Davis) and a Knicks team that had become the talk of the league.
The Lakers entered the fourth quarter trailing by six points before holding the Knicks to just 10 points through the first 11 and a half minutes of the quarter in a dominant defensive effort. Davis had 12 points but added 18 rebounds (16 defensive), one steal and four blocks.
“Last couple games, we said to ourselves, ‘We need to get back to a defensive mind-set, get back to getting stops,’” head coach Darvin Ham said. “We were able to do that Thursday and again tonight.”
After Brunson shredded their defense in the first half and most of the third quarter, the Lakers deployed an aggressive trapping scheme, double-teaming Brunson near halfcourt to force the ball out of his hands. They mixed up their defensive looks, sending blitzes with both their big men and guards, depending on whether the Knicks were performing a more traditional pick-and-roll or using guard-guard screening actions.
The Lakers had practiced the strategy at the team’s shootaround earlier in the day, just the team’s second of the week-long trip as they try to balance rest with preparation. With the Knicks shorthanded without injured regulars Julius Randle, OG Anunoby and Quentin Grimes, they didn’t have the offensive firepower to consistently make the Lakers pay. The Lakers played only six players in the fourth – Davis, James, Taurean Prince, Max Christie, Austin Reaves and Jaxson Hayes – with each contributing to the defensive success.
“Obviously, we were trying to get the ball out of Jalen’s hands,” Ham said. “Taurean had a hell of a task trying to guard him, keep him in check.
“Bron’s assignment was basically to be a one-man zone. You had Max chasing Donte…
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