If you caught tonight's match-up between the Lakers and the Sixers while channel surfing through League Pass, or browsing through the night's scores online, you most likely registered the Lakers' 124-93 victory as nothing more than a huge win. Well, those following the game, or those lucky enough to have taken a look at the box score just may have noticed something special.
Andrew Bynum rebounded from his weak showing on Sunday; literally, pulling down 16 boards en route to 17 points. The big lead allowed for the bench mob to get some crucial playing time. Rookie, Javaris Crittenton shattered his season high, scoring 19 points in just 23 minutes, Jordan Farmar contributed with 16, and Trevor Ariza (robbed of his starting job) put up 11.
D-Fish tacked on 17, Kobe, along with Ronny Turiaf added 15 a piece. Turiaf, starting for the suspended Lamar Odom shined in the spotlight with the pressure on, adding five blocked shots to the mix and leaving my dad and I with validation of the "there's no need for Lamar Odom" theory.
However, the truly awesome element of tonight's box is the simple fact that, with 15 points, Kobe Bryant was tied as the fifth leading scorer for the team. Please don't take this as Kobe hating, because I do try to shy away from some of the more rudimentary aspects of blogging about the Lakers; rather, take this as a novelty... something that hasn't happened in my memory of Kobe as a super-star, and will likely never happen again... unless, of course the stars align as they did tonight; and I'm not talking about the star on the back of Lamar's head.
The Lakers, fresh off of a big win over the ailing Clippers on Sunday, took to the skies today, en route to game one of their four-game road trip through the frigid central and northeast. A road trip that should go off without a hitch... that is, of course, If the Lake Show can maintain the level of play seen in the past few weeks. I know, I know, The Lakers are not playing great basketball. I would call it 'par' as of right now, but frankly, I feel as if 'par' will get them out of the road trip relatively unscathed. Still though, last season's record through 23 games haunts us all.
I was going to write a game-by-game preview on the road trip, but Jeff Skibiski over at Lakers.com beat me to the punch here. I started writing my version, until I stumbled upon Jeff's and came to the conclusion that, basically, the only additional analysis I offered that was worthy of stepping to the source was my new nickname for Zydrunas Ilgauskas; The Drune Dogg. I know.
Anyway, here is the gist of what you need to know:
I'm a realistic observer of the vast world that surrounds the Los Angeles Lakers. You can thank Nick Van Exel, Eddie Jones, Elden Campbell, Cedric Ceballos, and Vlade Divac for making that possible. The greatest person of all time is Francis Dayle "Chick" Hearn. There's no getting around that. Me? I'm eighteen years old and working my way to a journalism degree.
If you caught tonight's match-up between the Lakers and the Sixers while channel surfing through League Pass, or browsing through the night's scores online, you most likely registered the Lakers' 124-93 victory as nothing more than a huge win. Well, those following the game, or those lucky enough to have taken a look at the box score just may have noticed something special. 
