The Lakers honored Dr. Martin Luther King this third Monday in January and grabbed a 112-105 win over the Oklahoma City Thunder.
The team has had a difficult time winning lately, they’ve lost four of their last six games, one on the road and three at home. But tonight, as they tipped off their four-game homestand, they looked like they could have hit a reset button and made it tough for the Thunder to take this one from them.
Head Coach Darvin Ham was proud of the way his team could move onto the next play time after time tonight. “Everybody pouring into one another,” he said, “covering for one another and helping each other be great on both sides of the ball… I think we saw that tonight.”
At halftime, OKC’s Shai Gilgeous-Alexander had 16 points, going into the fourth he had 20. Los Angeles put the clamps on him hard, he finished with 24 points. LA’s defense only allowed him four points a quarter in the second half of the game. Vando was a big part of this effort. “Vando was amazing tonight,” Austin Reaves (15 points, seven assists, one block) said after the game, “only took two shots but impacted the game way more than the stats sheet will show.”
“It was a great team win, you know? That’s how we play,” said Rui as he walked off the floor with a big smile.
The Lake Show now sits at 20-21 and has five more games in Los Angeles (including the Clippers home game)—their next one’s Wednesday.