Every day in the NBA there is a lot to unpack, so every weekday morning throughout the season we will give you the three things you need to know from the last 24 hours in the NBA. A lot of teams may have looked at the Lakers' situation heading into Sunday night in Atlanta as the perfect chance to rest their star player: He had a sore elbow after a fall against Miami a couple of nights earlier, the Lakers are in the middle of 8-of-9 on the road (with tougher tests against Indiana and Milwaukee ahead), Los Angeles was facing a six-win team in Atlanta that is beatable without him, and the Lakers had a four-game lead in the West over the second-seed Clippers. LeBron James played anyway.