By james art PHOENIX — Despite strong performances from Anthony Davis, Austin Reaves and Rui Hachimura, the Lakers dropped their first game of the season to the Suns, falling 109-105 on Monday night at the Footprint Center to kick off their five-game road trip.
Davis’ season-opening 30-point streak ended at three games. He finished with 29 points (12-of-24 shooting), 15 rebounds, three assists and three blocks.
Hachimura finished with 20 points and 10 rebounds. Reaves scored 23 points (8-for-15 shooting), including 17 in the second half, with eight rebounds and three assists.
But with the Lakers trailing 107-104 with 37 seconds left after Davis blocked a Devin Booker jumper that would have put the Suns ahead by five points, Reaves missed a potential game-tying 3-pointer after a timeout with Booker (game-high 33 points ), grabbing the rebound.
“It was a great look, it just didn’t go through,” Reeves said. “You wish you had them back. I’ve been thinking about it since the game ended. If I make that shot, tie game, maybe we’ll get a stop and get a bucket.
“But [there are] many possessions in the game where he could have [done] something better. The performance was really good. We got the look we wanted. I just didn’t make the shot. But I will shoot it every time and live with the results.”
The Lakers got another stop while still trailing 107-104 with eight seconds left, but the Suns intentionally fouled LeBron James, who had struggled offensively for most of the game, to prevent him from attempting a potential game-tying 3-pointer.
James took the first free throw and intentionally missed the second. But the Lakers were unable to grab an offensive rebound and Bradley Beal (15 points) sealed the game with two free throws to put the Lakers at 3-1 on the season.
“I missed it on purpose to try to get an offensive rebound,” said James, who was noticeably under the weather Friday. “We didn’t have any more timeouts and we weren’t able to do it.”
Kevin Durant had 30 points for the Suns.
“We said we wanted to be a process team — I liked our process,” coach JJ Redick said. “I liked the way we started the game. I liked our level of competition to compete on defense. They put you in very difficult situations. I have to go watch it, but I felt like in some ways we lost out on Kevin Durant and Devin Booker’s ability to make tough doubles.”
Booker scored nine points in the fourth quarter, while Durant scored eight in the quarter, which the Suns won 33-22. All of Durant’s fourth-quarter points came within two minutes of the fourth: a fadeaway jumper over Reaves to put Phoenix up 99-98 with 4:04 left; a pair of free throws to give the Suns a 101-100 lead; a 16-footer over Gabe Vincent after a key layup to put the Suns ahead 103-101 with three minutes left; and seven feet over Vincent and Hachimurua to give the Suns a 105-101 lead with 2:17 left.
“If there’s anything to pick on, it’s probably me,” Reddick said. “I probably should have gone to the ‘fire’ [blitzing on defense] a possession or two earlier against KD. But I liked that group we had there defensively. I trust these guys.”
James was held to 11 points on 3-of-14 shooting, extending his streak of scoring in double figures to 1,226 games, but didn’t do it until late in the fourth when he knocked down a 3-pointer to cut the Lakers’ deficit to 105-104 with 1:58 left. until the end of the game.
“I would say for him and our group, we missed a lot of paint 2s,” Reddick said.
The Lakers shot just 21-of-50 in the paint, with James, who shot 67.3% in the paint last season, going 0-of-5.
Redick added: “For [James]these are shots he takes. In the fourth, he forced this miss to left. I missed a few of those one-legs that were right there in the paint. We gave him the space. They were very intentional about flooding when he was on that iso on both wings. So that’s something we probably have to talk about in terms of how we want to combat that against teams that do that.
In a turnaround from their Friday night game in Los Angeles, which the Lakers won 123-116 after erasing a 22-point deficit in the second quarter, the Lakers took a sizable lead early.
The Lakers opened up an 18-point (26-8) lead midway through the first quarter and had a 31-15 lead later in the period behind Davis’ strong offensive play, hustle and taking advantage of the Suns’ slow offensive start.
Davis had 16 points in the first quarter in nine minutes, as the Lakers also scored seven second-chance points and got easy baskets in transition.
But the Suns turned up the intensity on their defense.
And the Lakers’ early second-quarter and early-fourth-quarter lineups, an early bright spot, struggled in their minutes without Davis on the floor.
The Suns outscored the Lakers 17-4 in the seven minutes Davis sat between the first and second quarters, helping Phoenix take a 50-48 halftime lead. The Suns outscored the Lakers 25-14 in a second quarter in which the Lakers shot just 27.3 percent (6-of-22) from the field.
“We should never have a 14-point quarter,” Redick said. “This is my account too. Part of that is me. I have to make sure we have a good attack. I felt like it was a bit random. We were at a standstill. We talked about it at half-time: to be a high-level striker, we have to move bodies and we have to move the ball. They have to screen. They just took us out of what we were doing initially and we were great in the second half. In the second half we performed great. It’s just that the second quarter really hurt us.”
Reaves, Hachimura and D’Angelo Russell (14 points, eight assists) each scored eight points in the third quarter, helping the Lakers win the quarter 35-26 and take an 83-76 lead into the fourth.
The Lakers had a rough start to the fourth, allowing the Suns to open the quarter with a 14-3 run to take a 90-86 lead and help them cruise to victory.
The Lakers will continue their road trip against the Cleveland Cavaliers on Wednesday.
“I’ve got to come in and try not to lose two in a row,” Davis said. “Our mentality all year is to never lose two in a row.”
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