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OKLAHOMA CITY — It was more of a trickle the Lakers felt, the drops coming from the defending NBA champion Oklahoma City Thunder building momentum as Game 1 of their playoff series played out, eventually powerful enough to overwhelm Los Angeles.
Any mistake the Lakers made, no matter how small, the Thunder made them pay. Any lapse by the Lakers, no matter when, the Thunder made them pay. Any deviation from the game plan by the Lakers, no matter the time in the game, the Thunder made them pay in this second-round best-of-seven series.
The cost of it all for the Lakers was a 108-90 defeat to the Thunder on Tuesday night at Paycom Center.
“I don’t think there was a turning point. I think it was a general theme throughout the night,” Lakers coach JJ Redick said. “When we made game-plan mistakes, it bit us. I thought the Houston Game 5 was the most game-plan mistakes we’ve made in a playoff game so far. We obviously lost that game. You’re playing the world champs, your margin for error in terms of mistakes is not high. You make mistakes. Basketball is a game full of mistakes. It was just too many tonight.”
Thunder star Shai Gilgeous-Alexander scored only 18 points and had seven turnovers, but Oklahoma City looks too deep and too tough for the Lakers.
LeBron James led the Lakers with 27 points and six assists while Rui Hachimura had 18 points, but Austin Reaves had only eight points, shooting three for 16 from the field.
Also, the Lakers turned the ball over 18 times and that led to 20 points for the Thunder.
“I just thought we had some game-plan breakdowns,” James said. “You know, what we were preparing for, we had some breakdowns. And they’re going to test you, obviously. They’re going to see how many times they can make you have game-plan breakdowns ... and we had a few. Almost too many, obviously, versus a team like this. And we know what they’re capable of doing. They can go on a run where it’s like, ‘OK, we got it right here, two-possession game, three-possession game.’ And then boom. It’s a double-digit lead. And that’s what some of the great teams do, so just can’t have compound mistakes over and over.”
Game 2 is here Thursday night and that will give the Lakers an opportunity to clean up those mistakes.
They were sharp on defense against Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, frequently double-teaming him. He was limited to 18 points and turned the ball over seven times. Gilgeous-Alexander, last season’s most valuable player of the NBA and the leading candidate to repeat as MVP for this season, got off just 15 shots, making eight. He had scored over 20 points in 140 consecutive regular season games, an NBA record.
Still, James found no solace in holding down Gilgeous-Alexander.
“We’re down 1-0. This ain’t Shai versus the Lakers,” James said. “It’s the Lakers versus the Thunder. We’re down 1-0. That’s the main thing. Keep the main thing the main thing, and that’s who wins [or] loses. That’s all it’s about.”
But the Thunder just turned to Chet Holmgren, who had a double-double with 24 points and 12 rebounds.
There was a point in the game in which the Lakers held steady, coming back from a 13-point second-quarter deficit to get within four late in the third quarter.
But the Lakers didn’t help themselves at the beginning of the fourth quarter, turning the ball over on two of their first three possessions.
When Luke Kennard turned the ball over at the start of the fourth, Ajay Mitchell scored.
When Marcus Smart turned the ball over, Alex Caruso waltzed in for a layup, the Lakers went down by 15 points and had to call a timeout with 10 minutes and 41 seconds left to regroup.
They never did.
They fell into a 19-point hole in the final 12 minutes of play.
The Lakers lost by almost 30 points per game in their four-game series against the Thunder during the regular season, and one of the games was a 43-point shellacking.
Plaschke: Show Austin Reaves the money? Lakers might have second thoughts after Game 1 meltdown
In another tough playoff series, the beloved wingman struggles by making only three of 16 shots, just as he struggled the last two springs, causing concern.
The 18-point loss to the Thunder was just another reminder of what the Lakers are up against.
“We had our game plan and a few times we didn’t do exactly what we were supposed to do within the game plan and we got a little outside ourselves on the game plan,” Smart said. “And they made us pay for it.”
Lakers reserve forward Jarred Vanderbilt suffered a dislocated right pinkie finger in the second quarter and didn’t return. Vanderbilt tried to block a dunk by Holmgren, but instead hit his hand on the backboard and went down in pain. Vanderbilt left the Lakers’ locker room with a splint on his finger and it taped up.
