The Lakers showed fight against the defending champion’s the Thunder, but head coach JJ Redick made it clear that effort alone was not enough in a 119-110 defeat that exposed execution issues at crucial moments.
Both teams entered the matchup shorthanded, with Los Angeles missing Luka Doncic due to a hamstring strain while Oklahoma City sat MVP candidate Shai Gilgeous-Alexander with an abdominal injury.
Despite the missing star power, the game remained competitive behind performances from LeBron James, Austin Reaves, Jalen Williams and Chet Holmgren.
But Redick lamented the small mistakes made late in the game.
“I would say it’s a couple things just throughout the game and really like the key points of the game,” Redick said. “Us going up eight and then, down the stretch, I think when you play the best teams [like] in Oklahoma City, clearly they’re the best team and you have to have a really high level of effort.”
“You have to have a really high level of execution. So, it’s gotta be both. I thought for the most part, I thought our effort was fantastic. And in the key stretch of the game, our execution wasn’t great. A lot of that for me tonight was just defensively our shell principles, like basic shell principles. You know the three, the Jalen Williams three, his man was not supposed to help. That was an over help and that was in our shell principles. And then, down the stretch in, at times to start the fourth, I didn’t think we did a good job of getting LeBron [James] the ball. And some of that was, we called plays, and we didn’t execute. Some of that was just not having just the recognition. Him playing against smaller players was how we got back in the game and we didn’t do a good job of getting [him] the ball.”
READ MORE: Wizards Optimistic Anthony Davis Will Suit Up This Season Despite Rumors