Sports

The Lakers felt good about their starting lineup Thursday when Luka Doncic and Rui Hachimura returned from injury to restore their normal starting unit for only the seventh time this season. But that good feeling didn’t last long. Coming out of halftime down 10 points to the Houston Rockets, Austin Reaves missed the entire second…

PHOENIX — It’s not the lineups, the injuries or necessarily the system. The cause of the Lakers’ defensive demise is a thousand little decisions gone wrong. “It comes down to just making the choice,” coach JJ Redick said after the Lakers gave up 132 points in a blowout loss to the Phoenix Suns on Tuesday. “It’s making…

p]:text-cms-story-body-color-text clearfix”> People place bets at Santa Anita Park, where purses have declined along with the number of horses racing and lack of money coming from off-site betting. (Getty Images) Figuring out the purse for 34 of the 35 graded stakes races at Santa Anita is, for horsemen anyway, maddeningly simple: Just look up the…

Matthew Stafford was voted to the Pro Bowl this season, but the Rams veteran quarterback stopped concerning himself about the recognition more than a decade ago. In 2011, the then third-year pro passed for more than 5,000 yards and 41 touchdowns for the Detroit Lions. Stafford thought he had a chance to make the NFC…

p]:text-cms-story-body-color-text clearfix”> Chargers quarterback Justin Herbert runs with the ball against the Dallas Cowboys on Dec. 21. (Julio Cortez / Associated Press) Saturday, 1:30 p.m. TV: CBS, NFL Network. Line: Chargers by 1½. O/U: 39½. Houston has been a hard matchup for the Chargers, and can turn up the heat on Justin Herbert. But Jim…

CIF City Section and Southern Section high school boys’ and girls’ basketball scores for Tuesday’s games.

Facing an overmatched opponent that allowed him to freely tinker with his lineups, Mick Cronin tried plenty of mixing and matching Tuesday afternoon. The UCLA coach apparently liked what he found in reserves Trent Perry, Jamar Brown and Brandon Williams. Perry was a playmaking force with his scoring and smart passes. Brown did a little…

Next summer’s World Cup will be the largest, most complex and most lucrative sporting event in history, with 48 teams playing 104 games in three countries. The tournament is expected to draw a global TV audience of nearly 5 billion and FIFA, the event’s organizer, is hoping for revenues of between $10 billion-$14 billion —…

The Chargers got an early Christmas present Monday night courtesy of San Francisco, and they’re still hoping for more under the tree. With the 49ers beating the Indianapolis Colts, 48-27, the Chargers secured a postseason wild-card berth. The AFC West title is still in play too, and even the top seed in the AFC. The…

The Chargers will be without starting linebacker Denzel Perryman for the remainder of the regular season. The NFL on Monday suspended Perryman without pay for two games for repeated violations of playing rules designed to protect player health and safety, including an incident during Sunday’s game against the Dallas Cowboys. In the second quarter, Perryman…