Officially, the Lakers and Nuggets have to play one more game in this series before it’s over. Howevꦫer, there’s no stronger advertisement foಌr the league to go back to five-game series in the first round than this one.

Everything about the ending of Thursday’s Game 3 felt like the final game of a series with one team conceding they didn’t have it and the other ready to move on to the next round. Unfortunately for both sides, there is still a Game 4 to be played. But the writing is on the wall and the Lakers wrote it themselves. Saturday will likely be a formality.

For now, ✤here are the three big takeaways from Thursday’s loss.

The Lakers have a personnel problem

One of the glaring things that stuck out about the Game 3 loss is the guys the Lakers had on the court. And I don’t mean that in a “Why is Darvin Ham playing a small lineup” way but a “Why isn’t Darvin Ham playing certain guys” type of way. A lot of the Lakers’ problems in this series stem from Rui Hachimura being unplayable. On Thursday, he played 28 minutes and had five points, but could not stay on the floor when it mattered. In most matchups this season, Rui could punish the odd man out in a lineup and flourish. Denver does not have an odd man out and he has no one to punish offensively. And if he can’t contribute offensively, then his defensive shortcomings become even harder to live with. He’s not attentive enough to stick with Aaron Gordon — though, neither was LeBron James on Thursday — nor is he quick enough on the perimeter to hang with Michael Porter Jr. He isn’t big enough to deter Nikola Jokic, either, which leaves him with no one to guard. That’s a really big problem for a Lakers team that does not have Jarred Vanderbilt or Christian Wood. And it’s been clear since early in Game 1 that Darvin Ham does not trust Jaxson Hayes, who was a mixed bag in limited minutes. So, if the Lakers have three frontcourt pieces in LeBron, Rui and Anthony Davis and one of those can’t stay on the floor defensively, then the Lakers have a big problem, pun intended. This has forced Ham into playing three-guard lineups or lineups with Taurean Prince at forward, which have predictably led to Denver owning the glass again. It’s a damned if you do, damned if you don’t scenario for the Lakers, who don’t have an answer to the problems the Nuggets are presenting.

A defeated team

The Lakers started this game with an encouraging amount of energy, particularly defensively. But as the game settled into the middle stages and the Nuggets ground them to death, the life slowly drained out of the Lakers. By the time the fourth quarter rolled around, the Lakers looked like they had conceded the inevitable. This time, there was no run to make it a close game. The score is a deceiving one, thanks to Austin Reaves scoring 10 points in the final minute. This was, in fact, a team that had come to the realization that they didn’t have what it takes to beat this Denver team. That’s the toll that 10 straight preceding losses, including the backbreaking one in Game 2, takes on a team.

Denver is really damn good

I’ll put it in writing now, not that it’s much of a hot take: Denver is waltzing to a title this year. No one is stopping this team. Sure, they’re a bit thinner in their bench and have to rely a bit more on their starters. But no one is close to what the Nuggets are right now and I think that’s really important to point out. The Lakers are a really good team. They have been for two months. Like most teams in the NBA, they have flaws. Denver is incredible at finding those flaws, picking at them, and unraveling the team entirely. Rui is unplayable because Denver is targeting him, for example. Denver is also a team without flaws offensively. There is no one you can hide on. If Murray shoots 8-21 in this game, Aaron Gordon is going to score 29 with 15 boards. If Nikola Jokic is going to have a more human stat line of 24 points, 15 rebounds and nine points, then Michael Porter Jr. is going to score 15 points in the second half. There’s a lot of focus on what the Lakers are doing wrong or aren’t doing, but there just isn’t an answer for Denver. Not in a seven-game series and, for these Lakers, not in a single game. Thursday felt like the first time the Lakers really realized that.

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