{"id":649171,"date":"2026-05-04T14:33:18","date_gmt":"2026-05-04T14:33:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/649171\/"},"modified":"2026-05-04T14:33:18","modified_gmt":"2026-05-04T14:33:18","slug":"nba-playoffs-lakers-respect-thunder-insist-they-arent-intimidated","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/649171\/","title":{"rendered":"NBA playoffs: Lakers respect Thunder, insist they aren’t intimidated"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The Lakers<\/a> understand the daunting challenge they\u2019re about to face against the defending NBA champion Oklahoma City Thunder<\/a> in the Western Conference semifinals.<\/p>\n

Lakers coach JJ Redick<\/a> referenced the great Chicago Bulls teams that won back-to-back championships in 1996 and \u201997 and the Golden State Warriors teams that won titles in 2015 and \u201917 when talking about the Thunder after practice Sunday.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Thunder is one of the greatest teams ever in NBA history,\u201d Redick said. \u201cIt\u2019s just the reality. They\u2019re that good. I think our guys recognize that and respect that, and we know what kind of task we have in front of us.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Thunder had the best record in the regular season at 64-18. They were ranked first in defensive field-goal percentage (43.7%), first in defensive rating (106.5), first in net rating (43.7) and second in points given up per game (107.9).<\/p>\n

They have the league\u2019s reigning most valuable player in Shai Gilgeous-Alexander<\/a>, who is the leading candidate to repeat as MVP. He was second in scoring this season (31.1 points per game) and leads the postseason in scoring (33.8).<\/p>\n

The Thunder just swept the Phoenix Suns in their first-round series. The Lakers eliminated the Houston Rockets<\/a> in six games.<\/p>\n

This season the Thunder beat the Lakers by an average of 29.2 points per game in sweeping the four-game set. So the Lakers are facing long odds to win this series, but they say they aren\u2019t intimidated heading into Game 1 on Tuesday night<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou can respect the team but you can\u2019t fear them,\u201d forward Jake LaRavia<\/a> said. \u201cYou can\u2019t come into the game fearing the opponent and then you\u2019re just gonna come in and get punked. So, we respect how good this team is, but our goal is to win \u2014 win the games and win the series. So, our mindset stays the same.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Thunder have a reputation as a stingy defensive team \u2014 they were called for the seventh-fewest fouls per game (19) this season.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019re top five in every category that\u2019s disruptive-base: steals, blocks, turnovers forced, all that stuff. And they don\u2019t foul,\u201d Redick said. \u201cThey somehow do all of that without fouling, which is one of the most remarkable things, I think, in NBA history.\u201d<\/p>\n

Gilgeous-Alexander is famous for drawing fouls. He took nine free throws per game this season, third-most in the league.<\/p>\n

\u201cNobody\u2019s been able to stop him all season,\u201d Redick said. \u201cSo, you can hope and pray.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Oklahoma <\/p>\n

Oklahoma City star Shai Gilgeous-Alexander drives against the Lakers during a Thunder win on April 2.<\/p>\n

(Cooper Neill \/ Getty Images)<\/p>\n

The Lakers had their own weapon at the free-throw line, but it\u2019s unclear when Luka Doncic<\/a> might return from injury. The All-Star point guard hasn\u2019t played since sustaining a Grade 2 left hamstring strain against the Thunder on April 2. <\/p>\n

Doncic was coming off a magical month, becoming the only player in history other than Michael Jordan to score 600 points in March.<\/p>\n

Redick had no update on Doncic\u2019s status \u2014 he remains out indefinitely.<\/p>\n

But the Lakers got by the Rockets with LeBron James<\/a> leading the way. He averaged 23.2 points, 8.3 assists and 7.2 rebounds in the six games. And star guard Austin Reaves<\/a>, who also was injured in the April 2 game against the Thunder, returned to help beat the Rockets.<\/p>\n

Still, few think the Lakers, who advanced past the first round for the first time since 2023, can get by the deep and talented Thunder.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou could say nobody thought we were going to get past Houston, but everybody in this building believed,\u201d Reaves said. \u201cIt\u2019s the same mindset going into this. We obviously know the team that we\u2019re about to face and how good they are and the problems that they can create for 48 minutes. So, we\u2019ll have to lock in every single day, film, whatever it could be, to continue to get better and and pay attention to all the little details like they do.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Lakers understand the daunting challenge they\u2019re about to face against the defending NBA champion Oklahoma City Thunder…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":649172,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[574],"tags":[9356,64,63,726,314097,1862,314096,7220,2873,11473,109622,321,118505,11368,21938,314098,12841,85,16307],"class_list":["post-649171","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-basketball","tag-april","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-basketball","tag-first-round-series","tag-game","tag-great-team","tag-houston-rockets","tag-lakers","tag-luka-doncic","tag-nba-history","tag-point","tag-redick","tag-regular-season","tag-rockets","tag-seventh-fewest-foul","tag-shai-gilgeous-alexander","tag-sports","tag-thunder"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/649171","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=649171"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/649171\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/649172"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=649171"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=649171"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=649171"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}