On January 6th, Beijing time, in an NBA regular season game that has already ended today, the Lakers lost to the Rockets 115-119 away from home, missing out on a three-game winning streak. This game was very dramatic, with the Lakers once trailing by a large margin in the first half, but then making three consecutive turnovers in the final moments of the fourth quarter to lose the game.
At the beginning, both teams were back and forth, with the scores tied together. In the middle section, Green's big explosion helped the Rockets quickly take a double-digit lead; in the second quarter, the Rockets always controlled the situation on the court, maintaining a double-digit lead, with a maximum lead of 22 points; but in the second half, the Lakers' three-pointers suddenly opened up, and under James' leadership, they continuously hit three-pointers to narrow the gap. At the end, they relied on Davis' inside advantage to reduce the gap to only 2 points.
In the fourth quarter, the Rockets scored 10-0 again to extend the lead to 12 points; then after Davis came on, the Lakers continued to make a wave of high tide to reduce the gap to only 2 points; at the critical moment, Green and VanVleet stood up to score, followed by Davis' three-pointer and James' breakthrough layup as well as Shen Jing's 2 free throws and 1 made gave the Lakers a chance, but in the last 6 seconds, the Lakers made the most fatal mistake:
Christie made a turnover when throwing the sideline ball, and VanVleet directly stole the ball causing James to foul. From the slow-motion replay, Christie's sideline ball turnover was caused by three people:
- Christie, fearing a 5-second violation without passing space, did not call a timeout proactively but hurriedly threw the ball;
- James, at the moment Christie threw the ball, James was not ready to receive the ball, but was making a timeout gesture;
- The referee, not sure if all attention was on whether Christie had a 5-second throw, did not see James' timeout gesture.
It is worth mentioning that after being called for a foul on VanVleet, James walked over to argue with the referee and made a gesture indicating he had called a timeout. Judging from the slow-motion replay, tomorrow's referee report should write this as a missed call, but it is already too late for the Lakers.
Of course, VanVleet then made one of two free throws, leaving the teams only one point apart, theoretically giving the Lakers another chance; but this time Davis was called for a screen foul, completely ending the suspense of the game.