Blog: Lakers Shine in Dominant Overtime Performance Versus OKC

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Talk about rising to the occasion.

The Lakers turned in a flawless performance in overtime against the Thunder, a five-minute display of guts and excellence that led to L.A.’s biggest win of the season sans-LeBron James.

The deck could’ve not been more stacked against them. With James still recovering from his groin injury in Southern California and Rajon Rondo in street clothes on the bench, the lineup that Luke Walton finally landed on saved its very best for last Thursday night at the Chesapeake Energy Arena.

The 16-6 dismantling of the NBA’s best defense was truly a window into what this roster – specifically its young core – is capable of when the stars align.

“Specially beating a good team like that”, said Lonzo Ball. “In their home, in overtime, odds were against us. We pulled it out. I know (Head Coach) Luke (Walton) lost his voice, so I know he was doing the best coaching job he could do. We all did it together, from the coaching stuff to the last dude”.

The scene was as dramatic as it could be – almost perfectly scripted for a marquee matchup on TNT.

With the Lakers up by a triple coming down to the last play in regulation, the bench called for a foul on Russell Westbrook – the intention being to send him to the foul line to shoot a pair and regain possession. Ball did, but the foul was called in the act of shooting, awarding the Thunder star three shots. Westbrook calmly sunk all three, effectively sending the game to OT.

The NBA would later admit official’s mistake, but that wouldn’t come until hours after the final buzzer. Walton, Ball, and the Lakers had just a few moments to collect themselves.

“The message was simple: ‘how much fun is this?’ We have five more minutes of basketball to play now”, Walton said. “We wanted to win, but here we are. We have five more minutes, let’s enjoy this. Let’s go out and keep doing what we’re doing. Competing, rebounding the ball, pushing the pace, making plays for each other. And you know, I was impressed. We had a young group out there, and they could’ve folded to all that was happening really quickly, and it was good to see them stick together and not try to do it by themselves – which is where he have problems in the fourth quarter – but do it as a team.”

And they did. Emphatically.

After a sequence of misses from both teams, Ball was tied up going to the rim by Jerami Grant. The UCLA product won the jump ball against a player two inches taller, and the ball found him again seconds later for a 27-foot three pointer.

“I knew it was a tied game,” said Ball. “It was a big shot I needed to make, so I took it and made it.”

Splash.

“We know that Zo can do it,” Walton said. “It’s what we know he can become and it’s what we encourage him to try to do as often as possible. You can kind of see it when he gets that confidence going.”

The usually stoic guard celebrated appropriately.

The Thunder finally went cold from long distance, and the Lakers capitalized – led by the tireless work of Josh Hart and Ivica Zubac. They each grabbed 3 rebounds in overtime, limiting OKC’s offense to one shot per possession.

Hart snapped a streak of uneven performances by scrapping for loose balls and filling all the gaps. The Maryland native finished the night with 12 points, 10 rebounds, five assists and three steals.

“He came ready to play from the beginning,” said Ball about Hart. “I don’t think he missed any 50/50 balls that came by him from the beginning. We ask him to do a lot, at his size playing the 4 sometimes. Never complains, just goes out and does his job”.

The same could be said for Zubac – who dominated the paint at both ends of the floor and scored a career-high 26 points in 28 minutes.

Zubac kept the ball alive after a miss from Ball and was eventually fouled, hitting both free throws to extent the lead to 127-122 with 2:48 to go.

“Zubac was big,” said Ball. “He’s been big for us all year. Every time he’s got minutes, he’s producing. We had him on the floor and it didn’t look like he was tired, being that big. I was proud of him”.

Kyle Kuzma would also call his contributions “super huge”.

In the ensuing possessions, the defense held steady, and Ball extended the lead one more time with a layup in traffic.

Moments later after a Terrance Ferguson bomb, Kuzma joined the party by connecting on a 15-foot pullup jumper.

Ferguson was off the mark in his next attempt from long range, and the Lakers made them pay on a beautifully executed pick and roll between Ball and Zubac.

Ball was magnificent throughout the night, and downright deadly in overtime.

“I knew I had to,” he said. “It’s my fault he hit the three free throws. So, maybe I should have thought about that earlier. I had to brush it off and tell my teammates I got it in these last five minutes. I thought I did pretty good.”

What came next was the exclamation point, a play that illustrated the “trust the pass” mantra Walton preaches.

That happened to be Brandon Ingram’s first basket in a game where he handed out a career-high 11 assists.

The Lakers would then close out the game by hitting 3 free throws, finished the OT period a perfect 5-for-5 at the line. The battle of the boards was won handily (10-4) and the defense held OKC to 2-for-13 from the field.

The team committed no fouls and had zero turnovers. With Ball leading the way, everything else fell into place.

“For him to do that, (against) a player like Westbrook, who I’m sure Zo grew up watching and is one of the great point guards in our league, on the road to come after and not only score those points, but he had a couple of big assists to Zu rolling down the lane, and a big time rebound on this end,” said Walton. “He can do a little bit of everything when he’s feeling like that.”

Kuzma was also very impressed by what his fellow 2017 draftee managed to do in the face of adversity.

“Hell of a response from him”, he said. “Obviously we could’ve fouled in that situation…but for him to come in, not dwell on that, hit some big shots and passes in overtime. Helped win us the game.”

Source: Los Angeles Lakers

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