The L.A. Lakers entered Sunday’s game on a 3-game losing streak, showing major flaws as they struggled to get a grip on their season.
Even with LeBron James back in the lineup, the team has yet to become the squad they had hoped they could be.
The good news is, the Lakers did finally capture a win over the weekend, beating the short-handed Pistons in a blockbuster affair that involved a major altercation between LeBron James and Isaiah Stewart.
After the worst of it was over, the Lakers were actually able to rally from down double digits to come out with the gritty win.
According to Carmelo Anthony, it was exactly the type of game the team needed to finally turn things around.
“In the midst of the storm, it was just a matter of keeping everybody composed. We could have easily let the game slip away or continue to let the game slip away. But as a team we needed to come together in that moment. It’s unfortunate about what happened but we needed something like that to kind of spark our fire. We haven’t really had anything like that this year to test us from a physical standpoint. I think tonight, we needed that to spark something. And it did.”
"We could have easily let the game slip away but we needed to come together at that moment…we needed something like that to spark our fire." Carmelo Anthony played a key role in the #Lakers climbing back into tonight's game with 18 points on 5/8 from three. @LakersReporter pic.twitter.com/9983mpYDPB
— Spectrum SportsNet (@SpectrumSN) November 22, 2021
It’s far too early to determine the long-term impact of that game but, in its immediate aftermath, the Lakers used that energy to fuel their comeback.
As for Melo, his presence on the team has been a valuable one all season long, and the Lakers felt his impact again on Sunday when he scored 18 points on 62.5% shooting on the night.
No doubt, the Lakers are going to need everyone to be locked in if they’re going to turn their season around, and that includes Melo.
We’ll see before too long how this team fares moving forward, and if this little scuffle was the spark they needed to ignite a powerful run.
