For the first time in his 18 year career, a LeBron James led team has lost in the first round of the NBA playoffs.

Following Thursday night’s 113-100 loss, the defending champions LA Lakers have fallen 4-2 to the Phoenix Suns.

LeBron led the way for the Lakers with 29/9/7/2/2 but was still unable to overcome the missing presence felt by the loss of Anthony Davis early in the first quarter.

Phoenix came out strong from the jump scoring 36 in the first quarter – with Devin Booker having 22 himself, including 6 3s.

This marked just the beginning of a special night for Booker who had a career-high 8 made 3s, and a playoff career-high 47 points.

Phoenix fans can rejoice knowing now that their first playoff appearance since the 2009-10 season is one that sees them past the first round.

Booker stated how: ‘I’ve been working my whole life for this moment, so it wasn’t time to shy away from it’.

This win – or Phoenix’s success in the regular season – surely wouldn’t have been possible without the addition of the savvy veteran PG Chris Paul in the offseason, who’s success has clearly been noted in the numerous calls for him to win this year’s MVP award.

Paul never let the pressure of this series get to himself or his teammates, explaining how: ‘I just kept telling the guys to stay focused, there’s no better feeling than the last 30 secs when you’re dribbling the ball out in a closeout game’.

But despite the triumph of Phoenix in this series, it is still LeBron and the Lakers who are being heavily discussed.

For the first since 2010, LeBron has lost a playoff series before the Finals. And for the first time since 2006, the Finals will not contain either LeBron, the Lakers, or the Golden State Warriors.

If this truly is a sign of the changing of the guard in the NBA, LeBron stated how: ‘There’s some young guns in the game – Book, Donovan Mitchell, Luka, Ja Morant, Jayson Tatum – so many guys who are 23 and under who are flat out special… The game will be in good hands with guys like that’.

LeBron went on further to state how: ‘The season started so fast after leaving the bubble, the one thing that bothered me was we never got to see our full team at full strength because of injury or covid, we could never fully get into a rhythm and never really see the full potential of what we’re capable of.

‘In this offseason I’ll have like 3 months to rest, to get my ankle back to where it was before that Atlanta game [on March 20th]. That’s the most important thing to me’

With this Lakers faithful – and NBA fans as a whole – can rest easy knowing The Chosen One views this playoff loss as just a small setback rather than the end of his long reign.

Whilst LeBron uses his extended offseason to prepare for a comeback season in 2021-22, he made sure to give credit to the Suns: ‘I want to shout out Phoenix they were excellent this series, much respect to them’.

Now, Phoenix begin to prepare for their second round matchup against the Denver Nuggets, set to begin on Monday 7th, as they hope to extend their playoff run further.