Lakers at Nuggets Game Day 2026-03-05

Los Angeles Lakers

37-24 • 19-12 road

at

Denver Nuggets

38-24 • 16-12 home

· 7:00 PM PT · TV: Prime Video / Spectrum Sports Net / Spectrum Sports Net +

Spread: DEN -4.5 ·O/U: 238.5

Lakers

115.8 PPG

Nuggets

120.5 PPG

Team Leaders

Lakers

Luka Doncic 32.4 PPG

Deandre Ayton 8.3 RPG

Luka Doncic 8.6 APG

Nuggets

Nikola Jokic 28.7 PPG

Nikola Jokic 12.6 RPG

Nikola Jokic 10.3 APG

Key Matchup

Nikola Jokic (28.7 PPG, 12.6 RPG, 10.3 APG, 1.3 SPG, 0.8 BPG) vs Luka Doncic (32.4 PPG, 7.7 RPG, 8.6 APG, 1.4 SPG, 0.5 BPG)

Injury Report

Lakers

None reported

Nuggets

Out: Aaron Gordon

Day-To-Day: Cameron Johnson

Day-To-Day: Spencer Jones

Out: Peyton Watson

Season Series: LAL lead 1-0

The Lakers (19-12 on the road) visit the Nuggets, who are 16-12 at home. DEN is favored by 4.5 points.

What are your predictions? Will this be a tight game?

First of all the Lakers need to play the perfect game in order to beat a good team like the Nuggets. Stop the turn overs, play tough defense. This team has some veteran players. Got to stay close to them, put your arms up to throw their shooting off, just don't foul them. Take the ball away from Jamal Murray, by doubling him and make him pass the ball. Ayton will have his hands full with Jokic. Another dangerous player is Aaron Gordon. He is tall and can shoot over most Laker players, so maybe Rui can get in front of him. Rui is not my favorite on defense, but he does have size.

I sure would like the Lakers to beat this team.

Luka usually shows up in Denver, so if he plays at his usual level and the rest of the team chips in, especially on defense, this is absolutely a game they can win. But looking at the standings, I can also see the Lakers quietly tanking this one to stay in the 6 spot. Someone in the front office clearly views the Rockets as the preferred first-round matchup. I can’t stand that approach. At least make a push for home-court advantage, even if that’s easier said than done this late in the season - especially with how loaded the West always is.

Gordon the Laker killer is back...

AD used to play his best game against Jokic... Not expecting the same from the Lakers bigs...

Commenters at the end of last game mentioned that all of the Laker starters were in double figure scoring and that the Lakers are at their best when they are sharing the ball. That condenses my long posts into single sentences regarding the effect of LeBron and Luka trying to win games all by themselves.

Gotta at least TRY to close out on those 3's

LeBron bringing the Lakers back with his energy- reverse layup on the break and it's down to 9!

Now Smart to Hayes who flies high for the slam!

Luka with a tech- that's his 15th of the season, so he must be super careful now or get suspended.

Luka on fire, drains the triple! Good pass to Smart who hurts his hand trying to catch the pass. Kennard now from the corner! Down to 5 again.

Luka, Reaves are a piece of trash. Luka can not make free throws, complains about everything and finally the ref's give him a tech. Reaves he is just playing bad. Can not guard anybody, he looks weak. Is having problems scoring again tonight. LaRavia scored zero. Missed three attempts from long range wide open.

The only scorers tonight have been LeBron, Hayes and Kanard. Other then that, the bench Vando zero, Ayton two points I believe.

If the lakers were to play some defense, they could win this game. They are sporadic on there defense. I guess it all depends on what group is in.

Luka usually shows up in Denver, so if he plays at his usual level and the rest of the team chips in, especially on defense, this is absolutely a game they can win. But looking at the standings, I can also see the Lakers quietly tanking this one to stay in the 6 spot. Someone in the front office clearly views the Rockets as the preferred first-round matchup. I can’t stand that approach. At least make a push for home-court advantage, even if that’s easier said than done this late in the season - especially with how loaded the West always is.

Isn't it a little early to be tanking? I don't think they are tanking, it is just they are not as good as we fans would like the Lakers to be. They are terrible on defense, and the Nuggets have some pretty good shooters.

Apparently Ayton is injured, so Hayes is starting the second half

Good job by Lakers causing turnovers to keep themselves within striking distance

Reaves splits the D for the reverse, timeout Nuggs! Down to 4!

Luka, from waaaaaay downtown!

Luka now banks in the triple while falling out of bounds!! Cuts it to 7 after 3Q.

Hays the and-1, now stops Brown's drive. Lakers trying to make a move here down 9. Now Lebron to Hayes again, this time for the monster jam!

Lebron is hunched over and grabbing at his elbow after falling down- hope it's just the funny bone

Rui the midrange, 2 point game! Lebron is out though being with his left elbow being tended to

Smart with 2 great looks on those 3's, but just couldn't hit

Jokic working on a quadruple double- as he has 9 turnovers, but you can't let him roll to the basket like that SMH!

Game over as Luka misses the 3. Good fight but just couldn't get over the hump.

Lakers played really terrible tonight. A lot is the coaching. For example when they needed to score, why allow Smart a defensive player taking those last two attempts when you have a Kennard who is a real good three point shooter take those shots.

I could be wrong, but the Lakers are not going to go deep in the playoffs. They are not a consistent team on defense. They might not even make the playoffs. They got some tough games ahead. Tomorrow a back to back game against the Pacers will be tough on the road. Then I believe they have the Knicks, Nuggets etc etc. So the sixth spot is not for sure.

Highlights:

Isn't it a little early to be tanking? I don't think they are tanking, it is just they are not as good as we fans would like the Lakers to be. They are terrible on defense, and the Nuggets have some pretty good shooters.

I hear you, but when you only match up well with two teams in the entire league, you have to strategically think ahead about the standings and placement. Out of all the teams ahead of us, the Rockets are the only team that we could take in a seven game series. Could we take them? Maybe…. Will we take them? Probably not…. The rest of the teams would crush us 4-0. Let’s be real folks. This Lakers team is trash and isn’t going anywhere.

I thought I had read Gordon was back but they didn't need him anyway.

The same sentiment I'm pushing regarding balance and involvement was echoed by Showtime Laker James Worthy who called for Austin to be more involved at the end of games in particular though is being shut out. Luka wants the ball at the end of close games in particular and fails to share the ball enough to retain the balance. It's that simple and it needs fixed.

Austin again produced a thin first half scoring only 4 points tonight. Luka is leading the league in first quarter points. The big three, I'm afraid, is being reduced to the Big Two and a Half. The irony is that Luka would score more of his precious points if he would share the ball with Austin more than he does.

Doesn’t really matter. When you only have two players show up to a game against ANY team above .500, it’s hard to be competitive. Reeves gets in these slumps and it takes him awhile to get out of it. The last one he had was around Christmas time and then he had that injury and was out for some time. He came back strong, but here we are again. Smart had been playing good basketball, but he should not be taking end of game shots. Why wasn’t the ball in Lenard’s hands? He’s one of the only true shooters on this team.

We seem to be banking on our ability to sign Giannis this summer. We’ve all seen this movie before (E.G. Kawhi). We put all our chips into one player and the hold us hostage until all of the fallback options have slipped away and we are stuck signing last resort players and back in the same boat. I’ve read multiple articles mentioning Giannis may not even want to come here. Don’t screw this up again Lakers! We have very limited time with Luka. This summer NEEDS to be productive.

Not sure what happed there.

I hope the Lakers do not go after Giannis Antetokounmpo. He is a one trick pony as far as I am concerned. He does try hard, but I really do not see him being that great. After Lebron retires I would like to see the Lakers go after a couple of good power forwards that can play both offense and defense. We need players that can play defense in the worst way. Reaves is not a good defensive player, he is all offense, and so is Luka. Luka is great on offense when he gets help on a pick and roll with somebody screening for him. Other then that he is not that great of a shooter. He really is not a good dribbler, usually somebody playing him close will make him turn over the ball. He spends too much time arguing with the ref's and ends up getting a tech. Lakers are running out of time with only a few games left this season, and we have some players that we can not depend on. Like Vando when he comes into the game it seems like he comes in with a hang over. He needs to go for next season. But at the same time we have players that need more minutes playing like Timme and Kleber. Play Kennard more and give Reaves some rest, lately he has been exhausted, don't know why, but he is not into the game like he has been before. Team better shape up soon because there are still some tough teams up ahead. They had a golden opportunity of winning last night, but the team played in spurts. Would get back within one point of tying the game, only to give it back with no defense on the next play. NOT GOOD!