The Lakers Walked Into Atlanta and Won 124-114, and Our Hawks +1.5 Pick Missed by Ten

Los Angeles beat Atlanta 124-114, and that result buried our published pick. We had the Hawks +1.5, and they lost by ten. That's nowhere near close enough to cash a line that small.

Our read going in was that a Lakers team on the second night of a back-to-back, without Luka Doncic listed as Out, was getting too much credit for its recent 5-0 run. Atlanta was rested after two days off, playing at home, with only fringe-rotation absences and its core of Nickeil Alexander-Walker, Jalen Johnson and Onyeka Okongwu intact. On paper, that looked like a setup for a close game.

The final score is the final word. Los Angeles put up 124, Atlanta managed 114, and the gap was wide enough to bury the spread. We flagged the Lakers' offensive efficiency edge ourselves, and it held up. We just bet that Atlanta's home rest and intact core would keep the margin under a possession or two. It didn't.

What we got wrong is worth owning. We leaned on the argument that Los Angeles' away scoring was inflated by Doncic-era production, and that argument didn't account for how this team was going to perform without him. That's on us.

Congrats to anyone who rode the Lakers. We reload for the next slate. Tell us where we were off in the thread below.