Luka Helps Lakers Beat Hawks Without Reaves, Box Score Stats, Highlights for CJ, Kessler, More

The Los Angeles Lakers continue to roll.

Luka Dončić returned to the lineup after missing Sunday's win over the Detroit Pistons and led the Purple and Gold to a 124-114 Victory over the Atlanta Hawks on Monday at State Farm Arena.

While his streak of consecutive games with 40 or more points ended at four, Dončić helped make sure the 10-2 Lakers won their sixth straight contest even with Austin Reaves sidelined with an illness.

As for Atlanta, its own four-game winning streak came to an end as it fell to 7-5 despite impressive showings from CJ McCollum and Nickeil Alexander-Walker.

Player	PTS	REB	AST	BLK	STL
Luka Dončić (LAL)	32	8	10	2	5
Walker Kessler (LAL)	21	10	4	1	1
Sandro Mamukelashvili (LAL)	23	8	3	1	1
Collin Sexton (LAL)	18	2	6	0	1
Nickeil Alexander-Walker (ATL)	20	4	4	2	2
CJ McCollum (ATL)	21	0	4	1	0
Jalen Johnson (ATL)	15	7	4	0	2

With Dončić out on Sunday, the offense was largely a one-man show with Reaves dropping 43 points in the win over the Pistons. And with Reaves out for this one, it was only natural to assume it would be a one-man show with Dončić.

After all, Dončić scored 40 or more points in each of his four previous games and has been completely unstoppable this season.

Yet he struggled with his outside shot in the early going and instead shifted into a facilitator mode with eight assists in the first half. With Atlanta collapsing on him on a consistent basis, he set up Walker Kessler with looks around the rim all while Sandro Mamukelashvili and Collin Sexton provided a spark off the bench with their outside shooting.

It was inevitable that Dončić would also get involved in the scoring, and he started attacking the lane with the three-pointers not falling. The end result was an 11-point halftime lead as the Lakers largely controlled play against a Hawks team that was red-hot coming into play.

To Atlanta's credit, it bounced back from the poor first half and outplayed the Lakers in the third quarter thanks in large part to a balanced offensive attack. McCollum hit from the outside off the bench, Dyson Daniels facilitated and Alexander-Walker remained aggressive with his outside shooting.

On the other side, Dončić mixed in a turnaround jumper, stepback look and multiple threes as he kept the Lakers ahead with his individual brilliance even as the Hawks were cutting into the deficit.

Atlanta wouldn't go away in the fourth quarter either as McCollum hit a jumper in the lane and a three-pointer to cut the deficit to four with fewer than five minutes remaining. Even though the Lakers controlled the vast majority of the game, the mini-spurts kept the pressure on the visitors.

Ultimately, though, Los Angeles had Dončić and the Hawks didn't.

He scored in the lane and then found Jake LaRavia for a dunk to give his side some breathing room. It was enough to finally put Atlanta away and keep the winning streak rolling ahead of Wednesday's road game against the Milwaukee Bucks.