Since their In-Season Tournament victory, the Lakers are 1-5 and their leader LeBron James has given his honest thoughts about the team’s struggles.
The Lakers lost their third straight game after falling 124-108 to the Chicago Bulls on Wednesday night, where James finished just shy of a triple-double.
The almost-39-year-old scored 25 points, ten rebounds and nine assists in 37 minutes at the United Center.
After the game, he was asked about what the purple and gold’s main issue is.
“It’s a combination of everything,” James told ESPN. “It’s the emotional fatigue, it’s the physical fatigue, it’s the grind-of-the-season fatigue. And when you’re not winning that’s the frustration fatigue. So a little combination of everything.”
James pointed to similar reasons after the Lakers’ loss to the Knicks earlier in the week.
“Our energy was up and down throughout the course of the game,” LeBron said. “We were definitely feeling it. Definitely.”
On top of fatigue – travel, illness and inconsistency in the lineup has also been working against the Lakers.
LeBron’s right-hand man Anthony Davis knows they are just going to have to put their heads down and work hard to get out of the hole.
“There’s no break coming,” Davis said. “There’s no help coming. There’s no cavalry. We gotta do it within this locker room. We got everyone back … We just gotta get that one, get the spirits back up, and go from there.”
Head coach Darvin Ham shared similar sentiments to AD.
“It’s been a tough, tough stretch. No doubt about it,” Darvin Ham said Wednesday at the United Center. “We’re in the valley right now. … We’ll climb back up.”
Crowd favorite Austin Reaves has been a bright spot for his team and scored 21 points on 9-14 shooting against Chicago.
“Anytime we take the court we want to win,” Reaves said. “That is the standard, is to win. And will always be the standard. So when I say it’s gonna take time, it’s not like I’m saying we are willing to lose games figuring it out. We gotta figure it out … and win games at the same time.”
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