Kobe Bryant, Kevin Durant Shared Laughs During Thunder’s Demolition of Lakers

The Oklahoma City Thunder (19-9) are coming from a 100-99 win over the LA Clippers on Tuesday.

“I$3 chose to ask Kobe if he wanted to guard him”, Lakers coach Byron Scott said.

“They would love nothing more than to beat us by 40”.

And to think Bryant’s final road game will be April 11 at Oklahoma City, assuming he’s still standing.

In a conference call with global media on Monday (Tuesday morning Manila time), a transcript of which was also given to Spin.ph, the Lakers superstar said he’s making himself available to become a teacherto the current crop of players once his 20-year journey as a pro is over by season’s end.

Bryant has teamed with the Celebrities for Charity Foundation to raffle off two in-suite tickets for what will most likely amount to Bryant’s final game in Boston. I understand, you’re a fan and you bought your ticket which in my opinion gives you the right to boo or cheer as loud as you want. “The damn cat’s not going to bark”.

So, there’s no sense in yelling at them. Of course no one cares about that. And yet the Lakers only trailed by 10 because the Thunder was plagued by turnovers.

Thunder Down Under: Russell Westbrook, for doing it all with almost a triple-double.

The Thunder, who improved to 20-9 and third place in the Western Conference, put the Lakers away with a 22-0 run to start the third quarter.

Jumping the Lakers bi-weekly winning schedule, Bryant only needed a week to get LA its next victory. “They just blistered us”. “That’s just the honest-to-goodness truth”, he added.

Bryant flew high for an offensive rebound in the first quarter, pump-faked twice and scored on a high-arc baseline shot.

His 17 All-Star selections is second behind the 19 appearances by Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, the legendary Lakers centre. It was also blocked by Durant.

“I mean we’ll see”, said Kobe Bryant.

After Durant turned Bryant around with one of his signature crossovers in the second quarter, the two ran back down the court talking and laughing about it. Like everyone else in the world, it’s weird for Durant to see Bryant smiling as much as he is during games. Barton, despite only scoring two points in the second half, looked like vintage Kobe Bryant in the first half when he scored 23 points.

Westbrook had 23 points, eight assists and eight rebounds, and the Thunder steamrolled the Los Angeles Lakers for the second time in five days, 120-85 on Wednesday night.

“I was looking forward to it”, Durant said of the matchup with Bryant. That 118-78 embarrassment was the Lakers’ worst loss to the Oklahoma City/Seattle franchise.

To Bryant, those puzzles are even more fun when they’re against the best of the best. The Lakers lost the season series in four consecutive seasons prior to this one. This included 21 points from Gary Harris, despite suffering what looked like a scary knee injury in the first quarter.