Davis, Russell were key in Lakers’ victory over Mavs

LOS ANGELES – When it wasn’t Los Angeles Lakers forward Anthony Davis giving the Mavericks trouble from inside the paint on Wednesday night at Crypto.com Arena, it was guard D’Angelo Russell beating them from the perimeter.

Russell scored 29 points, and Davis collected 28 points, 12 rebounds and 10 assists as the Lakers ran away and hid from the Mavs in the second half and wound up winning, 127-110. Russell was 11-of-20 from the field, including 5-of-7 from behind the three-point line.

Meanwhile, Davis kept attacking inside and finished converting 12-of-17 shots, and also nabbed five offensive rebounds.

“He’s a great player,” said Mavs rookie Dereck Lively II, who spent a lot of time guarding Davis. “Being able to know he’s someone that’s as effective on the ball and with the ball, it makes you just try to press up on him and try to make him get out of his game. But it’s hard.

“He starts to get it going, and whenever he gets an advantage it’s hard to stop him because he’s a great player.”

The ability of Davis to handle the ball like a guard makes him even more difficult to contain.

“He’s playing at a very high level,” Mavs coach Jason Kidd said. “They’re playing to him. He’s getting to the basket (and) to the free throw line.

“You’ve got to try to double-team him, and then he’s playing on the perimeter to beat the double-team. You just got to try to make it as hard as possible and hopes he misses at the right time, but tonight he played well.”

When Lively was unable to slow down Davis, Kidd shifted the responsibilities to Maxi Kleber in the third quarter.

“Lively was struggling a little bit, and then also we wanted to make sure we got Maxi’s minutes in if we’re not going to have practice,” Kidd said. “We felt at that point D-Live was struggling a little bit to guard AD and we wanted to see Maxi guard him.”

In the end, Davis tallied 12 points in the third quarter and Russell tossed in 11 of his points in the third quarter.

Here are the three takeaways from the Lakers’ 17-point win over the Mavs.

THIRD-QUARTER COLLAPSE: For one half, the Mavs were virtually neck-and-neck with the Lakers and were seemingly poised to get out of Crypto.com Arena with a much-needed victory. The Mavs were only behind, 55-53, at halftime. But the Lakers took control of the game in the third quarter when they outscored the Mavs, 42-27. The Lakers were 15-of-23 from the field — 65.2 percent — in the third quarter. They also were 5-of-6 from three-point land in the third quarter.

DONCIC RETURNS – AND DID LUKA THINGS: Back in the lineup after missing three games with a right ankle sprain, Luka Doncic was back doing Luka things on Wednesday. The six-year veteran point guard scored 33 points, grabbed 13 rebounds and handed out 10 assists. Doncic played 36 minutes, was 12-of-24 from the floor, 2-of-9 from three-point range, and 7-of-9 from the free throw line. It was the 37^th 30-point triple-double of Doncic’s illustrious career, tying him with LeBron James for third place on the NBA’s all-time list in that category.

LEBRON JAMES HAD A SOLID GAME: LeBron James didn’t have one of his signature games where he’s just drilling one jumper after another while racking up a ton of assists and electrifying the crowd. But he didn’t have a quiet night either. The 21-year veteran finished the game with 25 points, eight rebounds and eight assists. Overall, James was 10-of-19 from the floor, including 3-of-7 from beyond the three-point arc in 33 minutes.

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