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The Los Angeles Lakers have defeated the Golden State Warriors in Game 6, wrapping up the series 4-2 and securing a spot in the Western Conference Finals. The Lakers are going back to this stage for the first time since the 2020 Orlando bubble, and their opponent will be a familiar one.
The Lakers will be playing the Denver Nuggets in the conference finals, and this is a rematch of the same series in the Orlando bubble in 2020. The Lakers managed to win that series 4-1, although Denver is the higher seed and does have homecourt advantage this time around. While some of the peripheral players have changed, the star cores for each side remain the same three years later.
The teams played four times in the regular season, splitting the contests 2-2. However, all four matchups came before the trade deadline where the Lakers made significant acquisitions and therefore may not accurately reflect how each team is playing at the moment.