Lakers turn to cool hand Luke
Lamar Odom was on the bench in foul trouble. Vladimir Radamanovic was largely ineffective. Pau Gasol was struggling to find open looks.
Kobe Bryant was taking over, as only he can, but you knew it couldn't last.
Denver would adjust. They'd double-team him, triple-team him if they had to. Trip him, foul him. When a guy drops 20 points in the first quarter, any team would have to at least make it hard on him, and Denver did.
In the second quarter, Bryant scored just five points.
Fortunately, the Lakers had Luke Walton.
For the second straight game, Walton came off the bench to spark the Lakers to victory.
"With all the good games Lamar had this year, it was nice to be able to come in tonight and help him out," Walton said.
After scoring 17 points in Sunday's Game 1, largely in relief of the foul-plagued Radmanovic, Walton came up with 18 points, seven rebounds and five assists in the Lakers 122-107 victory over the Nuggets in Game 2.
The playoff push has done wonders for Walton's confidence. All season, he's been plagued by injuries. It was frustrating, because after signing a new contract in the offseason, Walton was eager to show he was worth the commitment.
Better late than never.
Luke is getting his momentum back and playing with a lot of confidence," Lakers guard Sasha Vujacic said. "He has been great in this series. With our bench, it comes from all different people, but in this series, Luke has been stepping up.
"They (Denver) don't have a great match-up for him and he's been taking advantage."
Walton had to play a lot of minutes Wednesday in relief of Odom, who had three fouls at halftime, picked up his fourth foul early in the third quarter and his fifth foul just 20 seconds into the fourth quarter. Odom played just 22 minutes in the game.
With the Nuggets' assortment of power forwards trying to guard him, the quicker Walton was able to penetrate off the dribble and cut in the open space.
"I think I've just made a point of being more aggressive," Walton said. "My shot feels good. I feel comfortable. And guys have been getting me easy looks. When you get easy looks, it's easy."
One of Walton's biggest contributions came on the defensive end, drawing a charging foul on Carmelo Anthony midway through the fourth quarter.
The Nuggets had already started to lose their composure. Again. But the charging foul really set them off.
Anthony prostested the call. Allen Iverson drew a technical foul. Two free throws by Kobe Bryant later, the Lakers had a 108-94 lead with 5:19 to go.
"Luke was huge for us tonight," Bryant said. "And Lamar is going to be well rested for Game 3. I guess it's a glass half-full, half-empty kind of thing."
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