Los Angeles Lakers take on Oklahoma City Thunder in back to back games at the Staples Center – Game 4 Preview
Playing the first back to back game of this post season will be the Los Angeles Lakers and the Oklahoma City Thunder in their Western Conference Semi-Final Series. The game will take place at the Staples Center on Saturday night
and these two powerhouses will be going at each other again after a humdinger on Friday night.
After blowing past the first round in four straight games and winning the first two games of this series, OKC would have expected to gone down the road and come out with an away win. That would have been very much possible had
Kobe Bryant continued to struggle, but the Black Mamba finally started going.
Lakers managed to hold on to a 99-96 win Game 3 to make the series 1-2 and will look to make the best of the next game being played at home to even up the series.
The victory in game 3 came due to the resilience of Bryant as he finished the night with 36 points and finished the night 100% (18-for-18) from the free throw line. Kobe was not the only one brilliant from the stripe. The Lakers
had an astounding number of 42 attempts from the line and they managed to knock down 41 of those which is the second best NBA record from the line, with above 30 attempts in the playoffs. If the Lakers continue with their excellent penetration abilities and
free throw conversions then the Thunder can have some serious problems.
Lakers coach praised his team for the way they played, however he did emphasize on making the most of the opportunities which are not going to come much easier then at the free throw line;
"You have to knock those freebies down," Mike Brown said. "You're not going to get any better look in a game than a free throw. That's how good (the Thunder) are."
Such was the importance of getting to the free throw line in this one that OKC Head Coach Scot Brooks was really disappointed with the amount of time his team had sent LA to the stripe and allowed them to score easy points.
"We put them on the line," Scott Brooks said. "We can't do that. Down the stretch, you have to defend them without fouling and rebound the basketball. Unfortunately, we came up short."
Kevin Durant offered much resistance on the night for the Thunder by putting up 31 points; however a major portion of their scoring came from him, James Harden and Russell Westbrook. If any one of these three had failed to get
going offensively, this Thunder unit would not have even had the chance of being close, late in the game. The Lakers defence has not been able to shore up this front and will certainly want to choke at least one of the three in Game 4.
One other interesting fact in the series has been the physicality. Tempers have been boiling over in this series and there were certain moments of hostile nature last game as well. Westbrook and Metta World Peace were slapped with
double-technical for having a go at each other on a loose ball.
Things are started heating up in this one and with the way both sides have been at each other throughout the series, the next few games are surely promising to be very interesting.
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