LOS ANGELES — The outline hasn't really differed much in their past seven meetings, the four from last year's Western Conference finals and the three chances for revenge that the Lakers couldn't grab.

Generally, the game has been close, the Nuggets will then get into their late-game offense, and the game won't be close anymore.

Thursday, the problem-solving phase of the Lakers' preparation began, the late-game struggles against Denver obviously a piece of that planning.

"Well, we just gotta be better all around. Obviously, it's a great team that we're playing against," LeBron James said. "A team that won the championship, so they've been in a lot of big games and know what they want to get to late in games. So we just have to be very disciplined and have our mind into throughout the course of 48 minutes or however long it takes.

"It's gonna be challenging, but that's what the postseason is all about. It should be."

So far, the Lakers haven't been able to handle the Denver challenge — providing the series with plenty of easy-to-find storylines.

One of those is the Nuggets' late-game proficiency, where they've been able to seemingly make every big shot in every big moment to close the Lakers out.

"it's a combination of a couple different things. That's why I mentioned consistent discipline with our execution, make sure we get the right shots that we know makes us that much more hard to guard," coach Darvin Ham said of the late-game problems. "And give them credit. They had different guys step up and make big shots for them. We've had unfortunate turnovers, unfortunate missed blockouts. And they're a championship team. So, you have to do the little things.

"The intangibles have to be on point."

D'Angelo Russell, the star of another storyline after being essentially played out of the series a year ago, said his focus all year has been, in part, on some intangibles for postseason moments like this.

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