Tonight at 10:30 p.m. the Los Angeles Lakers (1-0) will conclude a second consecutive night of NBA action when they head to Oracle Arena to face the darlings of last year's postseason, the Golden State Warriors. Live stream the game here; Lakers fans can hear the game on 710 ESPN Radio, while Warriors fans may do the same on KNBR 680.
One year after shocking the Denver Nuggets in Round 1 of the NBA playoffs, and taking the eventual Western Conference champion Spurs to six games, the Warriors have big expectations of putting that play together for a whole season.
"I think we understand the position we're in," said point guard Stephen Curry. "We played well for a year. That's awesome. But we have to capitalize on that momentum."
The Warriors lost key bench players Jarrett Jack and Carl Landry this offseason, but were able to add Andre Iguodala, which should greatly improve their perimeter defense. "There's no secret, we're a good basketball team," said third-year coach Mark Jackson. "I'm not going to sit here and lie. We've come a long way. But now is the next step."
Meanwhile, the Lakers are fresh off a shocker at the Staples Center last night, in which they hung 116 points on the Clippers to kick off the year with a bang. Bench player Xavier Henry netted a career high 22 points in the victory.
"We're a deep team, and people don't think we're that good," Henry said. "That always fuels us. People are saying we're going to finish 12th or whatever, but we have a great group of guys who go out there and play hard. We're young. We're athletic. We get after it."
The Lakers will be without Kobe Bryant again, with Los Angeles revisiting the site of Black Mamba's torn Achilles tendon. There's still no timetable for Kobe's return.
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