{"id":487874,"date":"2026-10-07T08:48:12","date_gmt":"2026-10-07T08:48:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/487874\/"},"modified":"2026-10-07T08:48:12","modified_gmt":"2026-10-07T08:48:12","slug":"lakers-adou-thiero-shows-his-skill-in-preseason-loss-to-warriors","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/487874\/","title":{"rendered":"Lakers’ Adou Thiero shows his skill in preseason loss to Warriors"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

SAN FRANCISCO\u00a0\u2014\u00a0This was never going to be a game for the Lakers<\/a> to remember. But with nearly half of the roster sidelined because of injuries or resting, Adou Thiero<\/a> at least tried to inject some life into a sleepy preseason back-to-back.<\/p>\n

Thiero\u2019s towering one-handed dunk over two Golden State defenders provided a highlight in the Lakers\u2019 otherwise forgettable 124-98 preseason loss<\/a> to the Warriors at Chase Center on Tuesday. The Lakers leaned on their depth to get through their second short-handed preseason game in as many nights.<\/p>\n

Guard Quentin Grimes<\/a>, the only player starting a second consecutive game for the Lakers, had 12 points and three assists. Forward Sandro Mamukelashvili<\/a> started at center and had 15 points and a trio of three-pointers. Thiero, getting a rare starting moment, scored seven points and grabbed four rebounds while Bronny James<\/a> had four points and five assists in a starting role.<\/p>\n

Star guard Luka Doncic<\/a> sat out after scoring 21 points<\/a> in one half Monday against the Sacramento Kings. After setting the tone defensively against the Kings, forwards Ziaire Williams<\/a> and Matisse Thybulle<\/a> watched from the sideline Tuesday. The Lakers were also without center Walker Kessler<\/a> (finger), guards Austin Reaves<\/a> (ankle) and Collin Sexton<\/a> (lower body) and two-way forward Arthur Kaluma (lower body), who all missed their second consecutive preseason game.<\/p>\n

Thiero has been prepared for this type of opportunity. The second-year forward is trying to take advantage of his first true NBA preseason after knee injuries marred his rookie season. He played in his first summer league games, showing incremental progress during games in San Francisco and Las Vegas.<\/p>\n

Thiero started the summer moving too quickly through games, crashing into the lane and flying recklessly toward the rim. He even missed time from a minor wrist injury suffered during a fall. But as the summer progressed, he settled into the pace of the game. During a Las Vegas Summer League game, Thiero flashed his potential with 20 points, four rebounds, four assists, three steals and two blocks with zero turnovers in 30 minutes.<\/p>\n

\u201cI feel like that just came with playing more, and just understanding what I was supposed to do, understanding my role,\u201d Thiero said this week of his progress during the summer. \u201cI feel like my role during summer league is very different compared to my role during the season. I was on-ball more. Even creating the offense in summer league. And I didn\u2019t have much experience with that at the time, but as summer league kept going on, I got more comfortable with it and realizing when to speed up and everything.\u201d<\/p>\n

Thiero is fighting for minutes in a deep wing group led by Williams and Thybulle. The Lakers have stocked their team with versatile perimeter defenders to help complement their offensive-minded backcourt of Doncic and Reaves. Thiero, whom Reaves described as \u201ca freak-of-nature\u201d athlete, could add a unique quality to the rotation.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur ceiling rises if he\u2019s able to [contribute defensively] and be an impactful offensive player with crashing, with cutting, with touching the paint, playing off two feet,\u201d coach JJ Redick said before Monday\u2019s preseason game. \u201cI\u2019ve seen a lot of growth there from him over the last six, seven weeks. That\u2019s exciting.\u201d<\/p>\n

Thiero is enjoying the longest stretch of good health he\u2019s had in his professional career. The consistent practice reps have helped him understand and execute concepts better than last year, when even during his 25 appearances, Thiero admitted to being confused on the court.<\/p>\n

Redick said the then-rookie played with \u201creckless abandon.\u201d Sometimes it resulted in energizing dunks. Other times he would get caught in the air against multiple opponents. <\/p>\n

When faced with multiple defenders in the air Tuesday, Thiero didn\u2019t hesitate to challenge Golden State\u2019s Yaxel Lendeborg and De\u2019Anthony Melton. Teammates excitedly jumped off the bench, then hesitated when Thiero\u2019s right knee appeared to buckle awkwardly under him. <\/p>\n

When he straightened up, the Lakers exhaled.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"SAN FRANCISCO\u00a0\u2014\u00a0This was never going to be a game for the Lakers to remember. But with nearly half…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":487875,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[22031,6265,19538,8256,423,190537,48,52,51,1415,47,50,49,190207,116053,1417,7556,6049,190536,5931,104354],"class_list":["post-487874","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-los-angeles","tag-adou-thiero","tag-assist","tag-austin-reaves","tag-chase-center","tag-game","tag-incremental-progress","tag-la","tag-la-headlines","tag-la-news","tag-lakers","tag-los-angeles","tag-los-angeles-headlines","tag-los-angeles-news","tag-low-body","tag-matisse-thybulle","tag-point","tag-rebound","tag-role","tag-second-short-handed-preseason-game","tag-summer","tag-ziaire-williams"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/487874","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=487874"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/487874\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/487875"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=487874"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=487874"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=487874"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}