LOS ANGELES — Through all the unanswered questions surrounding a young Lakers team, their potential and their future, Lakers coach Luke Walton outlined one simple goal that could give him clarity on all of those three questions.

“All I’m trying to do is see our guys compete,” Walton said.

Nearly 2 1/2 hours later, the Lakers offered sobering results in the form of a 119-104 loss to the Clippers in a designated road game on Saturday at Staples Center.

The reasons for the Lakers (21-55) included the usual ones that secured the fifth consecutive season in which they lost the regular-season series to a Clippers (47-31) team that share the same building. Clippers forward Blake Griffin carved up the interior defense with 36 points and eight rebounds, while Clippers guard Chris Paul sliced through the perimeter defense with 29 points and 12 assists. But the result also became basically official only minutes after tipoff.

Then, the Clippers ran out to a 17-0 lead . The Lakers missed their first 11 shots. And though the Lakers would eventually trim double-digit deficits in both the second and fourth quarters, the Lakers received yet another reminder of a season-long problem with poor starts defining plenty of their losses.

“It’s a good example of what’s going to happen to us if we’re not engaged in the fight to start,” Walton said. “These are good teams we’re playing against. We can’t afford to start a game without that edge on us.”

With the Lakers lacking that edge, Walton yanked forward Julius Randle less than four minutes into the game. Then, Walton inserted reserve forward Thomas Robinson, who had lamented earlier to the starters that “we have to come out with that fire.” Robinson also felt perturbed that fire did not burn against a Clippers team that had already beaten them by 24 points less than two weeks ago.

So, Robinson played a large part in the Lakers producing some sizzle. He made the team’s first shot with 7:27 left in the first quarter. He tipped in a missed shot from Larry Nance Jr. to cut the deficit to 19-10 at the 5:26 mark. He made another putback that sliced the lead to 19-16 with 4:37 left.

Walton called those sequences “a lot of fun” as he saw the Lakers “scrapping.”

“I had no choice but to come in and try to make something happen,” said Robinson, who finished with 16 points on a season-high 7-of-15 shooting and nine rebounds in 22 minutes. “Fortunately, it went our way a little bit. We made the game a game again. After that, we need to be more consistent with keeping the pace.”

If only the Lakers learned their lesson the first time.

After the Lakers entered halftime trailing, 55-50, to the Clippers at halftime, that consistency vanished because of an issue that has plagued them countless times beforehand. The third quarter.

Then, the Clippers scored 38 points. Then, the Clippers outrebounded the Lakers, 11-4. Then, the Lakers mostly left the perimeter unguarded (as the Clippers went 4-of-6 from 3-point range) and could not defend the interior without fouling (as the Clippers shot 10-of-11 from the foul line.

“It’s a mindset,” said Randle, who had 14 points and five rebounds. “We’re not there yet, obviously.”

The Lakers have not been there nearly all season. They have lost 46 games after trailing in the third quarter. Among of those losses, 36 of them happened after also trailing in the first. While Lakers guard D’Angelo Russell conceded there was “definitely an energy factor” to start the game, Lakers center Larry Nance Jr. admitted, “we weren’t being aggressively.”

Some of those issues could stem from talent disparity. It did not help Lakers rookie center Ivica Zubac remains sidelined for the remaining two weeks, prompting Walton to feature Nance in the starting lineup for the first time all season.

But regardless of personnel, how do the Lakers avoid repeating the same mistake with their slow starts to open the first and second half?

“If we’d knew, we would fix it,,” Nance said. “It’s the whole scheme of what we’re doing right now, playing with different lineups, playing with different guys and seeing what lineups work and who brings the aggressiveness. That’s what we’re trying to see. I do my best to be the one bringing the fight to them.”

Walton contended Lakers guard D’Angelo Russell brought that fight, reacting to a two-point performance on 1-of-9 shooting with six assists and plenty of effort elsewhere. But it was the Lakers’ reserves along with rookie forward Brandon Ingram did the best job in bringing the fight to the Clippers.

Ingram, who had 18 points on 7-of-14 shooting after missing the past three games with tendinitis in his right knee, helped the Lakers go on a 9-0 run to ope the fourth quarter. Robinson then performed an up-and-under move. Ingram sank a 21-foot jumper. Lakers guard Tyler Ennis provided steady play in the backcourt. And Lakers guard David Nwaba scored nine of his team-leading 19 points in the final period.

“That’s definitely job of the bench, bring energy and make something happen whether we’re down or up. Create some momentum,” Nwaba said. “We stepped it up on the defensive end. We got stops. It led to some transition points. We kept going from there. We hit shots. That’s the biggest thing.”

As the Lakers’ painfully experienced this season, though, the biggest thing that has stunted their progress has involved sputtering starts to open the first and third quarters. With two weeks left before the regular-season ends, the Lakers’ lack of progress on that front cost them a potential upset victory over their crosstown rivals.

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