Lakers beat Cavaliers with five players thanks to Blake's triple-double

Wednesday night's game between the Los Angeles Lakers and Cleveland Cavaliers will one day be on ESPN Classics. That is not snark or sarcasm or exaggeration; it was one of the wildest games we've ever seen.

Entering play with just eight healthy bodies, the Lakers were down to five by the time the game reached it's closing minutes. Nick Young and Jordan Farmar both left hurt and Chris Kaman fouled out, making the situation so dire that Steve Nash rushed to change into uniform in the event he was needed.

And then Robert Sacre fouled out. According to the NBA rule book, Sacre could remain in the game with six fouls because the Lakers had nobody else they could bring in, but any foul he committed would also be a technical foul, giving the Cavs an additional free throw.

But the Lakers prevailed, winning 119-108 in the most unlikely victory of the NBA season. In the final 4:56 of the game, when they went down to just five players, the Lakers outscored Cleveland 11-9.

The Cavaliers were reportedly mired in locker room drama before this game, and they're probably drowning in it now. They shot just 37.6 percent and went 5-of-33 on threes, completely negating their major advantage on the boards and at the line. Kyrie Irving? 5-of-14. Luol Deng? 1-of-10. The defense? Non-existent.

Credit the Lakers, though, for fighting wire to wire, and credit Steve Blake in particular. Blake scored 11 points with 10 rebounds and 15 assists, recording just his second career triple-double, his first since April of 2010.

Here's how the other rag-tag Lakers fared in the victory:

(* - injured, + - fouled out)