LeBron James would yawn, often, when the cameras were, and weren’t, aimed at him. From early in the season, when the Lakers were still trying to tackle to unsolvable problems of last year, until deep into this playoff push, it never was much of a secret.
He was tired.
This was the best argument among plenty of credible ones why Monday evening would be it, the end to Year 20, the conclusion to a season in which he made history and improbably got his team to the conference finals.
The year was so long, so mentally exhausting, so physically demanding, that the Lakers and James wouldn’t be able to fight to extend it any longer.
Yet Monday night, James gave everything, all of the energy that was left in his 38-year-old body. He got his team close. He couldn’t get them any further than that.
Nikola Jokic hit the game’s biggest shot while two chances for James couldn’t get converted pushed Denver to the NBA Finals after a 113-111 win to sweep the Lakers.
Lakers forward LeBron James, left, attempts a shot that was blocked by Nuggets forward Aaron Gordon to end Game 4 on Monday night.
(Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times)
James finished with 40 points. He sat out for a little more than 4 seconds. He arrived at the arena hours before tip while the league orchestrated a practice run-through should the Nuggets receive their conference championship trophy.
“Yeah, it was a motivating factor for me,” James said with a grin.
A foot injury almost cost him his season, a torn tendon that almost required surgery. But while he recovered, the Lakers rebounded and rebuilt, energizing him with an opportunity to play on this stage.
“We had a great run. But we fell short of our goal. And our goal is to win championships.”
With two chances to tie in the final minute, James couldn’t score on his final two shots. One, a fallaway in the corner at the end of the shot clock, wasn’t close as it bounced off the side of the backboard. Then, in the final play of the Lakers’ season, James drove and tried to muscle up a shot, but Jamal Murray and Aaron Gordon kept the shot from making it to the rim.
“Just trying to get the ball in the hands of our best player and allow him to go make a play in an area on the floor where he’s comfortable,” Darvin Ham said.
Nikola Jokic, the series MVP, finished with 30 points, 14 rebounds and 13 assists.
“You’re always off-balance when you’re guarding a player like that,” James said of Jokic. “…There aren’t many guys in our league like that.”
Anthony Davis had 21 points, 14 rebounds and three blocked shots, but he couldn’t get the one-on-one stop on what would eventually be Jokic’s game-winner — a brute-force drive that he finished with cashmere-soft touch. Austin Reaves scored 17.
A switch among starters, coach Darvin Ham opening with his most effective lineup of the series with James, Davis and Reaves joined by Hachimura and Dennis Schroder, helped key a strong start, the Lakers clearly expressing their desire to continue their season.
And James was sublime, scoring 30 points with incredible efficiency and force — the culmination of 20 years in the NBA coming together for 24 near-perfect minutes.
“He came out with the mindset to keep this thing going,” Ham said.
The combination of speed and strength that he possessed on the first day of his rookie season could be seen as he sliced through the Nuggets defense. The skill he acquired through countless hours of work, that got displayed as he held his follow-throughs high and proud as he swished a three. And the luck he’d earned from never “cheating the game,” as James likes to say, well, that certainly didn’t hurt guiding a poorly aimed alley-oop intended for Rui Hachimura into the basket for three points instead.
“He came out on fire,” Davis said.
But for as good as they were in the first half, the Lakers were at their worst in the third quarter, Just like early in Game 1 and in the fourth quarters of Game 2 and Game 3, Denver continued to punish the Lakers with spurts of dominance that would go unanswered.
Monday that meant the Nuggets were 20 points better than the Lakers, Aaron Gordon getting hot from three-point range for the first time this series, the latest in a string of role players willing to step up to help Jokic and Murray.
The Lakers’ 15-point halftime lead would eventually be totally erased, replaced with a seven-point Denver advantage.
Lakers forward LeBron James, right, puts his forearm to the thoat of Nuggets forward Aaron Gordon during a scuffle in Game 4.
(Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times)
The Lakers came back, forcing a tie midway through the fourth, but when the ball swung to open shooters like Schroder or Hachimura, neither could connect.
They’d get another chance late, but Denver’s execution, like it was in crunch time of each of these games, always was sharper.
“They’re really good. Nothing short of a really, really, really good basketball team,” Reaves said. “They don’t have holes in their system. They’re not missing anything.”
As the Lakers and James left the arena, they did so with some cryptic messaging about the future. James, as he’s wrapped 20 years in the league, said he has some thinking to do despite this being a “pretty cool ride.”
“I got a lot to think about,” he said. “Just personally, with me moving forward with the game of basketball, I got a lot to think about.”
Davis talked about the sting from losing especially considering how quickly windows in the NBA slam shut.
“Don’t really do moral victories,” Davis said.
But they all left the arena knowing soundly that they’d been beaten. That Denver deserved the wins, despite the self-inflicted wounds from the Lakers along the way, the missed layups and the lousy transition.
Stories have endings. The Lakers extended theirs. But, Monday night after losing in four to Denver, the book on this season slammed shut — the rest of the offseason awaiting them.
This story originally appeared on LA Times
