The OKC Thunder and Los Angeles Lakers are officially set to square off in a highly anticipated semifinal matchup, with Game 1 scheduled for a Tuesday night, primetime tip.
Considering they’re the reigning NBA Champions and wrapped up the regular season as the league’s top-ranked team, it goes without saying that Oklahoma City is the clear favorite to advance to the Western Conference Finals.
Of course, some naysayers may be holding out hope that long-standing experience can help LeBron James lead his Lakers to a highly improbable upset, as Los Angeles’ 4-2 quarterfinal win over Houston marked the future Hall of Famer’s 42 series win of his illustrious career.
To put this into perspective, the Thunder have a total of 38 throughout their entire history.
Regardless of his advanced age of 41 -- which, crazily enough, is the same age as both head coaches in this series --, James is still producing incredibly for the Lakers, as he just wrapped up round one with impressive, stat-sheet stuffing averages of 23.2 points, 8.3 assists, 7.2 rebounds, and 1.3 steals in a whopping 38.5 minutes per night.
Of course, though the forward may still be producing at a remarkable level here in his 23 season in the association, it’s hard to envision LA coming out on top in a best-of-seven against the Thunder.
Even the great LeBron James likely can’t overcome mighty Thunder
During the regular season, the Lakers and Thunder played four games against one another, with the latter pulling out a clean series sweep while boasting a ridiculous point differential of plus-29.3.
It’s worth noting that half of these games were played without both Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and Jalen Williams in the fold.
In fact, since the start of last season, OKC has lost just one game against Los Angeles.
The Lakers are also playing a brand of postseason basketball that the Thunder are more than capable of taking full advantage of, particularly when it comes to their league-worst turnover rate and, coincidentally, Oklahoma City’s second-best ability to convert such blunders into buckets.
Add all this to the fact that not only did it take them six games to best a largely Kevin Durant-less Rockets team, but they’ll likely be playing this series without superstar Luka Doncic (hamstring) in the fold, and the odds of LeBron James adding series-win number 43 to his collection seem to be astoundingly slim heading into round two.
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