{"id":630595,"date":"2026-05-08T08:44:12","date_gmt":"2026-05-08T08:44:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/630595\/"},"modified":"2026-05-08T08:44:12","modified_gmt":"2026-05-08T08:44:12","slug":"thunder-pull-away-from-lakers-to-take-2-0-lead-despite-another-limited-night-for-shai-gilgeous-alexander","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/630595\/","title":{"rendered":"Thunder pull away from Lakers to take 2-0 lead despite another limited night for Shai Gilgeous-Alexander"},"content":{"rendered":"

Let the record show the Oklahoma City Thunder<\/a> were in a brief bit of trouble in Game 2 Thursday before winning 125-107 against the Los Angeles Lakers<\/a>.<\/p>\n

With 10:34 remaining in the third quarter, a single play saw Shai Gilgeous-Alexander<\/a> pick up his fourth foul, Alex Caruso<\/a> pick up a technical foul and Austin Reaves<\/a> get three free throws. He made all three, giving the Lakers a five-point lead and the ball while Gilgeous-Alexander had to sub out. That qualifies as trouble, by Oklahoma City standards.<\/p>\n

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And then the Thunder, with their remaining assortment of weapons, won the game.<\/p>\n

Despite getting nothing from the reigning MVP and Finals MVP for the remaining 10-and-a-half minutes of the third quarter, the Thunder ripped off a 21-5 run to take the lead for good. They now lead the Western Conference semifinal series 2-0 as it moves to Los Angeles<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The Lakers recovered enough to make it a five-point game in the fourth quarter, but the OKC defense remains a nightmare to come back against. There was palpable frustration for the Lakers throughout the fourth quarter, arguing with the officials on several occasions.<\/p>\n

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That continued after the final buzzer, when Reaves was seen leading an airing of grievances with the officials.<\/p>\n

Limiting Gilgeous-Alexander to 22 points should be a recipe for success against the Thunder. The Lakers have held him to 40 total across two games, the first time that\u2019s happened all season (his previous low across two games: 45 points).<\/p>\n

And yet, they are now 0-2 to show for it. In Game 2, it was because Chet Holmgren<\/a> had 22 points on 11 shots, Ajay Mitchell<\/a> had 20 points on 12 shots and Jared McCain<\/a> had 18 points on 11 shots. It\u2019s an unreasonable amount of talent, and the Lakers are still looking for a way to punch through after going 0-4 against OKC in the regular season.<\/p>\n

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With Luka Don\u010di\u0107<\/a> reportedly<\/a> unlikely to return during this series, it\u2019s about time for another brainstorming session. Game 3 is scheduled for Saturday (8:30 p.m. ET, ABC) at Crypto.com Arena.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Let the record show the Oklahoma City Thunder were in a brief bit of trouble in Game 2…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":630596,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[64],"tags":[56233,32235,11654,16733,137787,60517,3031,1055,3014,355,6402,6407,99,38139],"class_list":["post-630595","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nba","tag-ajay-mitchell","tag-alex-caruso","tag-austin-reaves","tag-chet-holmgren","tag-gilgeous-alexander","tag-jared-mccain","tag-los-angeles","tag-los-angeles-lakers","tag-luka-doncic","tag-nba","tag-oklahoma-city-thunder","tag-shai-gilgeous-alexander","tag-sports","tag-technical-foul"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/630595","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=630595"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/630595\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/630596"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=630595"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=630595"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=630595"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}