{"id":635795,"date":"2026-04-28T07:41:13","date_gmt":"2026-04-28T07:41:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/635795\/"},"modified":"2026-04-28T07:41:13","modified_gmt":"2026-04-28T07:41:13","slug":"lakers-look-to-secure-series-victory-over-the-rockets","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/635795\/","title":{"rendered":"Lakers look to secure series victory over the Rockets"},"content":{"rendered":"

Houston Rockets<\/a> (52-30, fifth in the Western Conference) vs. Los Angeles Lakers<\/a> (53-29, fourth in the Western Conference)<\/p>\n

Los Angeles; Wednesday, 10 p.m. EDT<\/p>\n

LINE: Lakers -2.5; over\/under is 208.5<\/p>\n

WESTERN CONFERENCE FIRST ROUND: Lakers lead series 3-1<\/p>\n

BOTTOM LINE: The Los Angeles Lakers look to clinch the Western Conference first round over the Houston Rockets in game five. The Rockets defeated the Lakers 115-96 in the last meeting on Monday. Amen Thompson<\/a> led the Rockets with 23 points, and Deandre Ayton<\/a> led the Lakers with 19.<\/p>\n

The Lakers are 33-19 against Western Conference opponents. Los Angeles averages 116.3 points while outscoring opponents by 1.7 points per game.<\/p>\n

The Rockets are 29-23 in Western Conference play. Houston ranks second in the Western Conference scoring 53.0 points per game in the paint led by Alperen Sengun<\/a> averaging 17.5.<\/p>\n

The Lakers’ 11.8 made 3-pointers per game this season are only 0.6 fewer made shots on average than the 12.4 per game the Rockets give up. The Rockets are shooting 47.9% from the field, 0.4% lower than the 48.3% the Lakers’ opponents have shot this season.<\/p>\n

TOP PERFORMERS: LeBron James<\/a> is shooting 51.5% and averaging 20.9 points for the Lakers. Rui Hachimura<\/a> is averaging 2.1 made 3-pointers over the last 10 games.<\/p>\n

Kevin Durant<\/a> is averaging 26 points, 5.5 rebounds and 4.8 assists for the Rockets. Jabari Smith<\/a> Jr. is averaging 3.1 made 3-pointers over the last 10 games.<\/p>\n

LAST 10 GAMES: Lakers: 6-4, averaging 107.8 points, 39.6 rebounds, 28.4 assists, 10.0 steals and 4.7 blocks per game while shooting 51.0% from the field. Their opponents have averaged 109.4 points per game.<\/p>\n

Rockets: 6-4, averaging 116.8 points, 46.5 rebounds, 24.6 assists, 9.9 steals and 5.1 blocks per game while shooting 47.2% from the field. Their opponents have averaged 108.2 points.<\/p>\n

INJURIES: Lakers: Austin Reaves<\/a>: day to day (oblique), Luka Doncic<\/a>: out (hamstring).<\/p>\n

Rockets: Fred VanVleet<\/a>: out for season (acl), Steven Adams<\/a>: out for season (ankle), Kevin Durant: day to day (ankle).<\/p>\n

——<\/p>\n

The Associated Press created this story using technology provided by Data Skrive<\/a> and data from Sportradar<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Copyright \u00a9 2026 ESPN Internet Ventures. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Houston Rockets (52-30, fifth in the Western Conference) vs. Los Angeles Lakers (53-29, fourth in the Western Conference)…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":588763,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[557],"tags":[307897,64,63,794,7220,7232,590,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-635795","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nba","8":"tag-307897","9":"tag-au","10":"tag-australia","11":"tag-espn","12":"tag-houston-rockets","13":"tag-los-angeles-lakers","14":"tag-nba","15":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/635795","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=635795"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/635795\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/588763"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=635795"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=635795"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=635795"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}