Lakers at Thunder
A very young roster figures to be plagued with inconsistency, and the Los Angeles Lakers are displaying that within the first two games. The Lakers will try to find the strong offense that carried them to a win in the opener when they continue their road trip with a visit to the Oklahoma City Thunder on Sunday.
First-year head coach Luke Walton is trying to build something with a very young core and watched 24-and-under studs Jordan Clarkson, Julius Randle, D'Angelo Russell and Brandon Ingram sink from a combined 28-of-45 in a 120-114 win over Houston in the opener to 9-of-32 in Friday's 96-89 setback at Utah. Ingram, who was 4-of-6 in his NBA debut on Wednesday, logged only four minutes on Friday before leaving in the second quarter with soreness in his right knee. One player who has no trouble bringing it every single game is Thunder superstar Russell Westbrook, who came within one assist of a triple-double in the opener and followed it up with 51 points, 13 rebounds and 10 assists in a 113-110 overtime victory over Phoenix on Friday.
TV: 7 p.m. ET, Spectrum SportsNet (Los Angeles), FSN Oklahoma
ABOUT THE LAKERS (1-1): Ingram was ruled out for the rest of Friday's game after exiting and will be examined again during Saturday's off day as Los Angeles takes a cautious approach with the 19-year-old, No. 2 overall pick. "When (Ingram) went back in and tried to run, he felt a little something, so whether it's tendinitis or something more I'm not quite sure, but obviously, we're going to keep a close eye on it," Walton told reporters. Clarkson, the oldest of the Ingram-Randle-Russell-Clarkson quartet, carried the Lakers down the stretch in the opener and finished with 25 points on 8-of-12 shooting against Houston but slumped to four points on 2-of-9 shooting against Utah.
ABOUT THE THUNDER (2-0): Westbrook scored 39 points in the second half and overtime, including the go-ahead layup with seven seconds left in the extra period and the clinching free throws, in the highest-scoring triple-double since Kareem Abdul-Jabbar in 1975. "Gotta get a win," Westbrook said in a TV interview after the game. "Gotta do what you've gotta do. Whatever it takes for us to get a win, that's what we need to do and we fought it out. ... I'm truly blessed to be able to play the game I love every night and leave it on the floor." Westbrook needed a career-high 44 field-goal attempts to reach 51 points on Friday after a more efficient 32 points on 11-of-21 shooting in Wednesday's opener at Philadelphia.
BUZZER BEATERS
1. The Thunder are 11-of-43 from 3-point range through the first two games.
2. Los Angeles PG Jose Calderon (calf) sat out the first two games and is questionable to make his team debut on Sunday.
3. Oklahoma City owns an eight-game winning streak in the series and took the four meetings last season by an average of 27.8 points.