Key #1 – Stop Kuzma and Randle
Along with Donovan Mitchell, Kyle Kuzma has undoubtedly been one of the biggest rookie surprises this season and clearly deserves to be considered one of the steals of the 2017 NBA Draft. He’s played a huge role in the Lakers improving upon last season and appears to be an instrumental piece of what could be a bright future in LA.
He is averaging 16 points per game to go along with 6.3 rebounds on the season and has been a solid deep-ball threat at 36.5 percent. He’s been even better of late while injuries have required him to assume a larger role as he’s putting up 19.7 points per game on 46.7 percent from the field and 37.8 percent from deep while grabbing 8.4 rebounds per game in LA’s last 12 contests.
Julius Randle, meanwhile, is having a terrific second half of the season and could create some difficult decisions regarding his impending restricted free agency. Though he’s at 16.3 points and 8.3 rebounds on the season, in February he went 19.4 and 9.0 while in March he went 22.3 and 9.9. In his last 12, he’s up to 22.6 points per game on 57.7 percent shooting from the field while nabbing 10.1 rebounds.
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In short, this pair of prolific frontcourt players could cause some issues for the Jazz based on how well they’ve been playing of late, their versatility and their ability to stretch the floor. Utah’s bigs will certainly have their work cut out for them and the Jazz may have to go small at times to hold both Kuzma and Randle in check, especially if Lopez isn’t playing.
Fortunately, despite how solid these two have been, with all the injuries their team has had to deal with, the Lakers just haven’t had the firepower to string together all that many wins of late. If that trend continues, it will likely take a big game out of someone besides Kuzma or Randle for them to win, and I feel confident that Utah’s overall superior talent and depth will be able to handle whatever Los Angeles throws at them.