On a Tuesday night game in Denver, Colorado, the Los Angeles Lakers took on the Denver Nuggets for the first game of their Grammys road trip. Following a tough stretch where the record of the Purple & Gold dipped to a point where they were on the verge of falling out of the top-six teams in the Western conference, the Lakers got a feel good win on Sun, Jan 18 versus the Toronto Raptors. That win came after they lost five of their previous six games and now the LakeShow was facing an injury-plagued Nuggets squad that was without Nikola Jokic(due to a knee injury), Christian Braun and Jonas Valanciunas. In spite of their lack of star availability, Denver was in third place in the West entering this game and they looked to use their Mile High advantage at Ball Arena to beat L.A once again. But the Purple & Gold had other plans and they executed them out well.

The Nuggets started the game shooting hot and had a lot of three-pointers, as they made nine threes in the first quarter while the Lakers barely kept up with paint points and a 16-point quarter from Luka Doncic. Down by nine to start the second quarter, the Purple & Gold got some surprise points from a recent contributor in Drew Timme, who had himself a fabulous scoring game in a Saturday night loss against the Portland Trail Blazers. Getting down by two, the Lakers couldn’t quite crack the mold yet as Denver pushed the lead back up to double-digits. Jamal Murray took over the game in the second quarter and had a massive 26-point showing in the first half, which ended on a thrilling beyond-half court shot made by him at the buzzer. With a 71-57 lead, the Nuggets were looking good on their home floor, but they were struggling with shooting from three-point range and that would come back to bite them in the second half.

Denver pushed its lead to 16 points in the early minutes of the third quarter, but Los Angeles started making some shots and getting some defensive stops. Luka took over as he scored or assisted on 17 straight Lakers points to get them down by only a few points. The Nuggets only scored 17 points in the quarter as LeBron James made a couple of good baskets to conclude the period with L.A down by only two points. In the fourth quarter, the Lakers finally tied the game a couple of times and took the lead on two made free throws from Doncic. Marcus Smart then scored six points in a row to push the lead up even higher and Denver just kept missing shot after shot after shot. A Smart three-pointer with over two and a half minutes left pushed the lead to a dozen points and was essentially a dagger shot. Following a couple of threes made by the Nuggets, LeBron sealed off the game with an amazing dunk. Some made free throws concluded the game for the Lakers, who won by eight points in their first game against Denver this season.

Luka had a triple-double for the fifth time this season, as he scored 38 points, grabbed 13 rebounds and dished out 10 assists. LeBron had a solid outing with him putting down 19 points, nine rebounds and eight assists in nearly having a triple-double himself. Smart scored 15 points and made three 3-pointers, with contributions from Rui Hachimura, Jaxson Hayes and Timme, who all had nine points each. Jamal Murray vanished in the second half, as he only scored two points and missed so many shots. His teammates tried their best to pick up the slack, as Aaron Gordon and Peyton Watson had 18 points each and Spencer Jones scored 16 points. Overall, the Lakers shot 51% from the field and made 10 out of 25 three-pointers, while Denver went ice cold from three-point land in the latter three quarters of the game. In spite of missing 11 free throws, the Purple & Gold managed to score nearly the exact same amount of points in the second half as they did in the first half(58 to 57). A 115-107 win gave the Lakers a good start to the back end of their schedule in 2025-26, as they jumped into fifth place in a tight Western Conference logjam between the second-place San Antonio Spurs and eighth-place Golden State Warriors.

Having a mostly healthy roster following some injury hiccups, the Purple & Gold remain without Austin Reaves, who has been out since early December with a calf injury. But J.J Redick did say before the game against the Nuggets that Reaves has made some good progress in his recovery and is expected to return during the eight-game road trip. Before his injury, Reaves was one of the best scorers among guards in the NBA, as he averaged 26.6 points per game and had 6.3 assists as his average. Reaves’ return will be a much-needed boost to a Lakers roster hungry for depth. Until that happens, the road trip will continue on as the Purple & Gold make a slight detour back to Southern California to take on the Los Angeles Clippers at the Intuit Dome in Inglewood for a Thursday night game. The Clippers defeated the Lakers in their most recent game on Sat, Dec 20, 2025 as they won a low-scoring game. With a surging record that has put them up to tenth place in the conference standings, the Clips will be looking for a win to keep themselves afloat in the play-in picture.

The battle for Los Angeles on Thursday night will certainly be a good one, but for now the Lakers are victorious in Denver and will play the Nuggets two more times in the regular season. Another matchup at Ball Arena will occur on Thur, Mar 5 and Denver will certainly be more healthy for that game. Nine days later, the Purple & Gold will host the Nuggets in a Saturday Primetime game at Crypto.com Arena. A potential third playoff series between these two rivals in a span of four seasons could happen, but that will be unknown until three months from now when the regular season ends and the playoff brackets are set. The Lakers still have plenty of work to do in solidifying their place among the Western Conference’s most elite teams, but this was a statement win regardless of the lack of health of Denver’s roster at the moment.