LeBron James had 35 points, 16 rebounds and seven assists to lead the visiting Los Angeles Lakers to their seventh straight win, a 129-114 decision against the Dallas Mavericks on Friday night.

Kyle Kuzma started in place of Anthony Davis and scored a season-high 26 points for the Lakers.

Davis, the leading scorer (27.1 points per game) and rebounder (9.4 boards per game) for the Lakers, sat out after taking a hard fall against the visiting New York Knicks on Tuesday night and sustaining a contusion to his gluteus maximus.

Dallas forward Luka Doncic, who came in third in the NBA in both scoring (29.6 ppg) and assists (9.0 per game), got off to a slow start before finishing with 25 points, 10 rebounds and seven assists. However, he committed a game-high six turnovers.

Tim Hardaway Jr. added 22 points for the Mavericks, who have dropped five of seven, and Seth Curry scored 16 off the bench.

The Mavericks cut a 21-point deficit to 10 during the third quarter, but the Lakers ultimately took a 99-86 lead into the fourth.

Los Angeles then scored the first seven points of the final quarter to move ahead by 20 points.

The Lakers scored 45 points in the opening quarter, their highest-scoring quarter of the season, and took an 18-point lead into the second.

Los Angeles used a 10-0 run to take a double-digit lead for good at 24-9 with 5:29 left in the first quarter. They shot 17 of 28 (60.7 percent) in the opening quarter, including 5 of 8 from 3-point range, while the Mavericks shot 10 of 28 (35.7 percent) and 2 of 11.

Los Angeles continued to add to its lead early in the second quarter, moving ahead by as many as 22 points with 9:13 left.

Dallas made another push to cut the deficit to 62-50 with 4:46 remaining in the half, but the Lakers produced a second straight strong finish to a quarter and took a 79-58 lead into the break. It was also the Lakers' top-scoring half of the season.

The Mavericks played their sixth straight game without 7-foot-3 forward Kristaps Porzingis (right knee soreness), who is second on the team in scoring (17.3 ppg) and rebounding (7.6 rpg) and leads in blocks (2.1 per game).

--Field Level Media