Can the Los Angeles Lakers be Defeated
Can the Lakers be Defeated? When a team has a history of winning like the Los Angeles Lakers do, just the mystique involved in playing such a team can be intimidating to opponents.
No team in NBA history has won more games than the Lakers nor does any team have a higher winning percentage (61.8%). Since being formed in 1948, the team has missed the playoffs only five times, the last time coming in the 2004-05 season. No team has made it to the Finals more than the Lakers (30) and their fifteen wins are second only to the Boston Celtics who have won 17.
Los Angeles is one of three teams never to lose 60 or more games in a season. This season they were actually three games from 60 wins for the regular season with a record of 57-25, good enough for first in the Western Conference. With one of the best players in the game leading a team of players led by one of the most successful coaches in playoff history in Phil Jackson, the #1 seeded Los Angeles Lakers look like an early favorite to close the gap between them and the Celtics by winning their 16th NBA title.
The Road to the Championship
Earning the first seed and getting to the playoffs was just the first step on the road to the championship. However, drawing the Oklahoma City Thunder as their opponent in the first round was not as easy as your typical #1/ #8 match up.
The Thunder was the hot team down the stretch run of the final weeks of the season. They were not expected to be a playoff contender this year, but the dominating play of Kevin Durant matched with the vastly improved play of former UCLA star Russel Westbrook made Oklahoma a team to be reckoned with.
They managed to press the Lakers hard in the first two games of the series, but the arsenal in L.A. was too much for the young Thunder to stop. Oklahoma would battle back to take the next two games, tying the series at 2 games apiece. However, the battle tested Lakers were too much for the young Thunder and won the next two games to close out the series.
After being tested in the first round by the Thunder it would not have been surprising to see the Lakers come out a little flat in their second round series against the Utah Jazz. The exact opposite happened in fact, and the Lakers came out with all guns blazing. Pau Gasol and Kobe Bryant lead the charge for the Lakers as they scored 111 points in three of four games on the way to a 4 game sweep of the Jazz.
One More Hurdle to go
With their strangle hold firmly in place over the Western Conference yet again, the Lakers once again look like the favorite to return to the Finals from the Western Conference. The Phoenix Suns would like nothing more than to put an end to that hold and return to the Finals themselves for the first time since the early 1990s.
Phoenix is fresh off a sweep as well. Steve Nash and company silenced the curse, the critics, and more importantly the San Antonio Spurs in their semi-final match up. Historically, the Spurs have had the Suns number, but this time it was the other way around. Phoenix swept the Spurs in four games to earn the right to battle the Lakers for a trip to the Finals.
Los Angeles and Phoenix are no strangers to playoff meetings. The first of eleven completed series came back in 1970 with the Suns losing 4 games to 3 after getting out to a 3-1 lead. L.A. would own the Suns throughout the 1980s easily winning the 5 playoff match ups the two teams had.
Phoenix finally got that first elusive series win in the 1990 conference semi-finals beating the Lakers easily, 4 games to 1. History would continue to be kind to the Suns in the coming years. Phoenix would win a tough series in 1993, but not until the Lakers had pushed them to the brink of elimination. L.A. would have an easy time with the Suns during the 2000 playoffs winning 4-1. The 2006 series would be full of intrigue and controversy, but in the end the Suns would come back from a 3-1 deficit to win the series. The following year the Suns would dispatch the Lakers easily winning 4 games to 1.
This year Phoenix Suns are not thinking right, the first game Lakers walked all over them. If history continues to be on the side of the Suns, the Lakers may have to start clearing out their lockers but the way it look so far, it won't come to that.
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