Tomorrow the Lakers will take on the Nuggets in Denver in Game 1 of the Western Conference Finals. The two teams met four times during the regular season, winning twice each.
However, all their regular season games against each other were played before the trade deadline. Since then both Denver and Los Angeles even more so made changes to their rosters.
Lakers head coach Darvin Ham was asked ahead of Game 1 what he can draw from those regular season wins against the Nuggets.
“Just defensively, and once again you have to be on time, doing your work early, extremely active and getting multiple efforts,” he said. “But they’re a different team now, we’re a different team. So you look at that for what it is, the basic tenets of what was successful. But that pretty much stops there.
“You got to come out ready for this new wave. I think Jamal [Murray] is playing at a high, high level. Obviously Joker is playing at a high level,” Ham continued. He singled out Bruce Brown as a huge X factor for the Nuggets.
“All of their guys, their support players are really, really capable. MPJ [Michael Porter Jr.], KCP [Kentavious Caldwell-Pope], Jeff Green, Bruce Brown who I think is a huge X factor for them with what he’s able to do and how versatile he is on a basketball court.
“So we have our work cut out for us. And again, the biggest thing is us not being a step slow. Just coming out playing on our toes, not on our heels and being ready to give multiple efforts.”
