Lakers at Warriors
The Los Angeles Lakers own the best record in the Western Conference and stayed out of the fray during the trade deadline madness on Thursday while the NBA-worst Golden State Warriors were one of the most active participants. The two teams on opposite ends of the standings will square off when the Warriors host the Lakers on Saturday.
Los Angeles plans to be active on the buyout market and free agent point guard Darren Collison was spotted sitting next to owner Jeanie Buss during a 121-111 home loss to the Houston Rockets on Thursday. "I don't know," Lakers star LeBron James told reporters when asked about the possibility of his team adding Collison. "I don't like talking fantasy basketball, I've never been one to talk fantasy basketball. We'll see what happens, but I don't really have too much to comment on that." Golden State is treading water this season with Stephen Curry (broken hand) sitting out most of the season and Klay Thompson (knee) expected to miss the whole campaign and traded another former All-Star by sending point guard D'Angelo Russell to the Minnesota Timberwolves in a deal that brought back Andrew Wiggins and a pair of draft picks. The Warriors are hoping Wiggins can be a better compliment to Curry, Thompson, and Draymond Green when they attempt to compete with the Lakers atop the West next season.
TIME: 8:30 p.m. ET. TV: ABC, NBA TV Canada
ABOUT THE LAKERS (38-12): Los Angeles is in a battle with arena rivals the Clippers and missed out on a player both teams coveted when veteran forward Marcus Morris ended up with the Clippers after the dust cleared on Thursday. The Lakers may have had one of their flaws exposed on Thursday after the deadline when the Rockets did not play a player taller than 6-7 and managed to shoot 50.6 percent from the floor, though James did not seem concerned. "They made a couple big shots, we had a couple turnovers and they had a couple stops," James told reporters. "When the game was going back and forth, it allowed them to kind of take that back and forth and they kind of took control in the last three minutes."
ABOUT THE WARRIORS (12-40): Golden State also dealt Glenn Robinson III and Alec Burks to the Philadelphia 76ers in exchange for draft picks and sent Omari Spellman and Jacob Evans to Minnesota in the Wiggins deal. That leaves the Warriors without three of their four leading scorers in Russell (23.6 points), Burks (16.1) and Robinson (12.9) and opens more minutes for rookies like Eric Paschall and Jordan Poole. Wiggins is averaging 22.4 points and career highs of 5.2 rebounds and 3.7 assists in his sixth season after being drafted No. 1 overall in 2014.
BUZZER BEATERS
1. Lakers SG Danny Green scored 15 points on Thursday after scoring in single figures in each of the previous four games.
2. The Warriors went 5-of-39 from 3-point range in a 129-88 loss at Brooklyn on Wednesday.
3. Los Angeles rolled over Golden State 120-94 at home in the most recent meeting on Nov. 13.