Shorthanded Lakers Can’t Keep Up With Thunder

The Los Angeles Lakers faced an extremely tall task on Tuesday night when they welcomed the defending champion Oklahoma City Thunder to town.

The Lakers were blown out by the Thunder at full strength in Oklahoma City last week and in this one, they were without their top four playmakers in Luka Doncic, Austin Reaves, LeBron James and Marcus Smart, plus backup center Jaxson Hayes. With that being the case, the Lakers were unsurprisingly blown out in a 123-87 loss to the Thunder.

Chet Holmgren got the Thunder off to a quick 8-2 start, forcing the Lakers to use a timeout. Drew Timme, who got a rare start, helped settle L.A. in after the timeout with a 3-pointer.

Timme continued his hot start with 10 of the Lakers’ first 15 points, while Adou Thiero brought some much-needed energy off the bench and even hit a triple of his own. Jarred Vanderbilt and Kobe Bufkin also got in on the action from deep, but the Thunder were hot as well and led 34-27 at the end of the first quarter.

Rui Hachimura heated up to begin the second with seven straight points to tie the game while Luke Kennard was also finding his teammates for open looks.

Unfortunately, Thiero took an elbow to the face by Chet Holmgren and was forced to go back to the locker room. The Lakers’ offense slowed down significantly from there while the Thunder steadily built their lead back up to 65-47 going into the halftime locker room.

Thiero was able to return for the second half, which was a good sign for the Lakers. Outside of that though, there wasn’t much good happening for the Lakers as the Thunder continued to extend their lead in the third quarter.

Hachimura was the only real source of offense for the Lakers, who went into the fourth quarter trailing 93-62.

With the game effectively out of reach, the Lakers’ two-way and end-of-the-bench players got some solid run in the final quarter to close it out. While there was no comeback to be had, guys like Timme, Thiero and Bronny James were given a chance at extended minutes, which hasn’t happened a lot this season.

What’s next for the Lakers…

The Lakers will finish out the regular season with three more games this week, taking on the Golden State Warriors on the road on Thursday and then the Phoenix Suns and Utah Jazz back at home on Friday and Sunday, respectively.