The foundation is crumbling fast around the Los Angeles Lakers, who looked like championship contenders after going 15-2 last month.
The Lakers (50-29) now find themselves pressed to find enough healthy players for their next matchup against the host Golden State Warriors (37-42) on Thursday night.
Los Angeles sits a game behind the Denver Nuggets for the No. 3 spot in the Western Conference playoffs, while Golden State will likely be the No. 10 seed and compete in the play-in tournament.
The Lakers lost their third straight game on Tuesday, falling 123-87 at home to the Oklahoma City Thunder. The injury-plagued squad played without Luka Doncic (hamstring), Austin Reaves (oblique), LeBron James (left foot injury management), Jaxson Hayes (left foot soreness) and Marcus Smart (ankle).
Rui Hachimura led the Lakers with 15 points against Oklahoma City. Los Angeles recorded their lowest-scoring outing of the season and was 14 of 31 (45.2%) from the foul line.
“We’ve got to find nine guys that are, like, all in on us fighting and willing to go out on whatever metaphor you want to use — I don’t want to use a war metaphor in this time — but whatever you got to do to go out and fight and be all in on the team,” Lakers coach JJ Redick said. “We’ll find the nine guys. It’s a great opportunity for us over the next three games to find those guys.”
One bright spot in Tuesday’s loss was the play of rookie forward Adou Thiero, who scored a career-high 10 points in a career-high 21 minutes.
Thiero’s performance was overshadowed by a heated exchange between Redick and forward Jarred Vanderbilt, who confronted his coach after being pulled from the game just 16 seconds into the second quarter. Vanderbilt was benched for the rest of the contest.
“It’s, you know, nothing personal with him. Normal stuff from my end,” Redick said. “I think for all of us, you know, being undermanned, we’ve got to scrap and claw, we’ve got to all be on the same page, we got to be great teammates, we got to all play hard. Called a timeout to get him out of the game. And he reacted, but again, normal interaction for me.”
Los Angeles has won two of its three previous meetings against Golden State this season, including a 129-101 road victory on Feb. 28.
The Warriors snapped a four-game losing streak with a 110-105 home win over the Sacramento Kings on Tuesday. Stephen Curry scored 17 points and committed three turnovers in his second game back from a right knee injury
“Part of (Curry) getting back is recognizing that decision-making is really gonna matter next week when we’re in the play-in,” Golden State coach Steve Kerr said. “He knows he had a little bit of a ragged game handling the ball. He’ll make the necessary adjustments.”
The Warriors used their 40th different lineup of the season on Tuesday after rookie guard Will Richard was scratched with a back injury.
Golden State forward Draymond Green had seven assists in the victory and acknowledged that he’s not looking forward to the upcoming play-in tournament.
“It’s not exciting,” Green said. “I’m a competitor, so going into the game I’m going to do all I can to win, but it’s not that exciting. I’m not going to sleep tomorrow night like, ‘man I got this play-in next week.’ “
