Online Reporter
Chet Holmgren had 24 points and 12 rebounds to lead the Oklahoma City Thunder to a 108-90 home win over the Los Angeles Lakers to open their second-round playoff series on Tuesday.
The Thunder remained undefeated in the playoffs, taking a 1-0 advantage in the best-of-seven Western Conference semifinals after opening the postseason with a sweep of Phoenix.
Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and Ajay Mitchell added 18 points each as Oklahoma City shot 49.4 percent from the floor and 43.3 percent from beyond the arc.
“I thought we were a little fast at the beginning anyways,” Thunder coach Mark Daigneault said. “That might’ve just been the layoff, we just hadn’t played in eight days so that’s some of it. I told the team, and I feel this way, you can’t be greedy with a playoff win.
“That was not a perfect game. There’s a lot of playoff games that are not perfect. The other team’s trying their best to squeeze you and make you very uncomfortable. So we won an imperfect game tonight, and that’s a good thing.”
LeBron James led Los Angeles with 27 points.
After a pair of blowout losses to Oklahoma City late in the regular season, the Lakers were still within striking distance in this one into the fourth quarter.
But early in the fourth, Jared McCain hit back-to-back 3-pointers to extend the Thunder lead to 19 and start putting the game away. “I think it was a general theme throughout the night — when we made game-plan mistakes, they hurt us,” Lakers coach JJ Redick said.
“You’re playing the world champs — your margin for error in terms of mistakes is not that high. You can make mistakes, basketball’s a game full of mistakes, there’s just too many tonight. We’ve got to clean that up.” McCain, a trade deadline acquisition, scored 12 points off the bench as Oklahoma City’s reserves outscored Los Angeles’ 34-15.
The Lakers’ 90 points were their fewest in a postseason game since 2021. Austin Reeves, who was injured against the Thunder late in the regular season and returned late in the Lakers’ first-round series vs. Houston, finished with just eight points on 3-of-16 shooting. “I think we did a good job of executing the plan on him,” Daigneault said. “With him, you can’t give him any crack . . . make him earn everything.”
About midway through the second quarter, Los Angeles’ Jarred Vanderbilt hit his right hand on the corner of the backboard while trying to defend a Holmgren dunk. Vanderbilt went down, grabbing the hand, and soon went to the locker room and did not return. After the game, ESPN reported that Vanderbilt dislocated his right pinky.
“We’re obviously disappointed that that happened,” Redick said. “It’s a freak injury.”
Though James added plenty of scoring, he didn’t record his first rebound until the final minute of the third quarter. He finished with six assists and four rebounds. — Reuters
Mathew Masinge