A short-handed Los Angeles Lakers team beat the Kevin Durant- and Kyrie Irving-led Brooklyn Nets by 25 points on Saturday night.
Because it was a matchup between arguably the best offense and defense in the entire league, folks were understandably hyped for the matchup.
That said, due to the blowout nature of the game, there wasn’t much to get excited about on the court. A brief scuffle between Irving and Dennis Schroder was explosive, but that was largely where the fun ended.
After the game, Andre Drummond spoke to reporters about whether the evening’s events made him look forward to a potential Lakers-Nets finals matchup more or less.
“We’re just gonna take care of what we need to take care of and if it’s them we see in the Finals, or whoever it may be, we’re just gonna play to the best of our ability and try to come out with wins,” Drummond said.
Drummond finished the game with 20 points and 11 rebounds in just 22 minutes of action, and he did it all while schooling LaMarcus Aldridge.
This is significant because there was a decent amount of chatter about whether the Lakers should have pursued Drummond or Aldridge after the NBA trade deadline.
While Drummond was reluctant to throw fuel on the fire of a potential rivalry between his squad and the Nets, Kyle Kuzma had no such qualms. He openly mocked Brooklyn following the Lakers’ win.
Will the Lakers and Nets ultimately square off in the Finals this year? Time will tell.
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