4 things the Nuggets must do to sweep the Lakers out of the playoffs again
By Ben Handler
The NBA playoffs finally get underway on Saturday and the Denver Nuggets get to start their title defense. They’ll do it against the team they swept in the 2023 Western Conference Finals, the Los Angeles Lakers.
The teams are a lot different than last season, but it’s the same story and the same key players. The Lakers are hungry for revenge, while the Nuggets are hungry to prove that last season was no fluke.
Denver has beaten the Lakers in nine straight meetings, including last year’s playoff series, even prompting LeBron James to claim that the Nuggets have the Lakers’ number at one point. But the Lakers are still a good basketball team and they’ve been peaking in the second half of the season.
They still have two future Hall of Famers in LeBron and Anthony Davis, who are both likely to make All-NBA teams this season. At times they’ve looked like an elite team and even a title contender, they just haven’t been able to look that way against the Nuggets.
But none of that matters now as it’s a brand new 0-0 series. The past has no bearing on this series, and the Nuggets will have to start from scratch and beat the Lakers four more times to move on. They are more than capable of doing it, and if they play their best they should pack the Lakers up again. But they’ll need to be really good to do it. Here’s how.