The Los Angeles Lakers would like to start the new year with a win against the New Orleans Pelicans. The night before, they lost badly to the Minnesota Timberwolves.

The Lakers did lose, though, to the Pelicans 129–109. They would end 2023 with another depressing loss, leaving them at 17–17 and.500.

Since Cam Reddish was out, Rui Hachimura got to start. He scored the first basket of the night for Los Angeles, who were down 11–4 at the start of the game. The Pelicans’ Zion Williamson and Brandon Ingram each scored a basket, but the Lakers were only behind 21–17 at the half.

A quick layup by LeBron James gave the Lakers their first lead of the night. But CJ McCollum made a three-pointer that gave the Pelicans a 10-point lead. Unfortunately for the Lakers, their defense wasn’t very good, so they were behind 42–33.

Los Angeles didn’t have a great start to the second because they were two steps behind on both ends of the floor. Even though Anthony Davis had a block that made the highlights, the Pelicans had little trouble scoring and increased their lead to 16.

James made back-to-back threes to cut the lead back to ten points, but Herb Jones made two threes of his own to keep the Lakers from scoring. Even though James scored some bold buckets, Los Angeles was still behind 74–57 at halftime.

Around the middle of the second quarter, Hachimura was taken out of the game because he had strained his left leg.

When Hachimura came off the bench for the second half, Reaves got the ball and made his first basket from the corner. James was able to get Los Angeles’ attention, just like in the first half, but the Lakers were still behind 86–74.

James excited the crowd with a huge dunk in transition, but he missed a tough layup the next time down and couldn’t make the most of it. Davis was getting called for fouls, so New Orleans was able to score 100 points by the end of the third quarter. In the fourth, L.A. was behind 104–89.

Much of the first part of the fourth quarter was the same, as the Lakers still had trouble getting over the hump. Each time the team had a chance to get back in the game, a bad mistake or missed shot made it harder to get back on top.

The purple and gold fought hard to try to make one more run as time ran out. But they couldn’t get going and would go home with another loss.