Overview: A Christmas Day Challenge for the Lakers’ Defense
The Lakers head into a high-stakes Christmas Day matchup with the Houston Rockets, and the focus isn’t just about lineups or injuries. It’s about the accumulation of tiny decisions that have eroded a once-stout defensive identity. After allowing 132 points in a recent outing, questions around execution, communication, and discipline loom large. As coach JJ Redick noted, the problem isn’t a single flaw but a series of choices that add up to a leaky defense.
What Is Undermining the Lakers’ D?
Analysts and observers have pointed to a thousand small moments that derail a rotation or misread a shooter’s track. The Lakers have struggled with help defense, late closeouts, and an uptick in either overhelp or underhelp scenarios that leave gaps for kick-outs and easy scores. The issue isn’t raw athleticism; it’s the consistency of decision-making under pressure. When players hesitate or overcommit with the ball fakes, the defense becomes reactive instead of disciplined, letting opponents exploit angles and reset possessions at the rim.
Redick’s Perspective: It Comes Down to the Choice
Coach JJ Redick emphasized that the margin between a good stop and a breakdown is often a single moment—whether a defender chooses to hedge, to switch, or to sprint to a shooter in the corner. “It comes down to just making the choice,” Redick said after the latest defensive lapse. The comment captures a broader coaching philosophy: in basketball, cognitive load matters as much as physical effort. Small, consistent choices midway through a possession compound into reliable defensive outcomes or costly mistakes.
What Houston Brings to Exploit and Counter
The Rockets present a mixed test: quick ball movement, shooting gravity, and a willingness to attack gaps off drives and drives-and-kicks. The Lakers must shore up their integrity on pick-and-roll coverages, maintain discipline on cutters, and avoid switching into uncomfortable, mismatched situations. The Christmas Day game offers a chance to reset with a defined opponent and environment before the calendar turns, but it also heightens scrutiny on every defensive rotation.
Solutions: Fixes That Could Turn the Tide
To reverse the trend, the Lakers should emphasize:
- Communication and pre-rotation cues in transition and on weak-side rotations.
- Staying connected on shooters; no unnecessary closeouts that invite kick-outs and open 3s.
- Better ball-screen defense with timely hedges and a more organized drop or switch scheme tailored to Rockets’ personnel.
- Rim protection awareness: when to help without abandoning the paint or allowing a secondary scorer to slip into space.
- Energy management: ensuring stamina doesn’t turn into late-possession misreads and coverages that collapse the defense late in clocks.
Expectations for Christmas Day
Heading into a marquee date on the calendar, the Lakers want to demonstrate that their defensive identity can withstand scrutiny. The Christmas Day test will reveal whether recent lapses are fixable mechanical errors or signs of a deeper, systemic issue. If the defense can translate patience and clarity into consistent rotations, they’ll turn the message from a cautionary tale into a proving ground.
In the end, the Lakers’ defense is less about who is on the court and more about the choices they make in real time. The upcoming game against the Rockets could be the turning point where those thousand little decisions converge into a single, positive outcome—fewer points against and a restored sense of defensive accountability.
