The Lakers were destroyed by the Warriors in Bronny James' first start in Los Angeles

The undermanned Los Angeles Lakers briefly led the Golden State Warriors in the two teams' preseason finale on Friday night. A full 115 seconds to open the game.

Afterwards, the sharpshooting warriors gained permanent control of their encounter. Golden State got off to a dominant 66-40 start in the first half and compounded the loss with a robust 66-34 score in the second half to finish with a whopping 58-point lead, 132-74.

Even the normally enthusiastic Stu Lantz was ready to go full throttle after the third quarter, considering the contest was a one-sided blowout and ultimately a meaningless performance.

However, there was more to the Lakers' one-sided defeat than the numbers initially suggest. That's because head coach JJ Redick has his top 10 players lined up. All-Stars LeBron James and Anthony Davis; starters Austin Reaves, D'Angelo Russell and Rui Hachimura; and bench players Gabe Vincent, Max Christie and Dalton Knecht all rested. Backup big men Jarred Vanderbilt and Christian Wood continue to recover from offseason surgeries. However, Golden State head coach Steve Kerr used all of his healthy veterans except All-NBA point guard Stephen Curry. A massive talent shortage led to the epic collapse.

To start, Redick brought in LeBron's son, No. 55 draft pick Bronny James, to replace his old man as the 6-foot-2 small forward. Veteran Cam Reddish took over a power forward position, Jaxson Hayes was the club's starting five, second-year point guard Jalen Hood-Schifino did very little as the team's starting point guard and Exhibit 10 newcomer Quincy Olivari played the main role at shooting guard.

One would think the Warriors dominated primarily with their 3-point shooting, and that was part of the problem, but far from the only problem. In this department, the Warriors shot 13 of 36 (36.1 percent) from distance, while the Lakers shot 7 of 29 (24.1 percent). Golden State also dominated Los Angeles, scoring 68-36, while the Lakers committed a whopping 28 turnovers (the Warriors had 13). Olivari and Bronny James seemed particularly rough in this regard. At some point in the fourth quarter, Olivari almost stole the ball from a fellow Laker.

The story of the evening, from a long-term perspective, was Bronny James' excitingly productive evening. The 6-foot-2 point guard had his first double-digit scoring night of the preseason, scoring 17 points on 7 of 17 shooting from the field (1 of 5 from beyond the arc) and 2 of 2 from the foul line . He tossed in four rebounds, three steals, one block and one assist – despite posting a brutal plus-minus of -37. For the Lakers, however, that was actually the fourth-best value of the night.

Bronny's performance at the rim was particularly encouraging.

However, Olivari had the greater evening. In a game-high 39:01, he scored 22 points on 8 of 16 shooting from the field (5 of 9 from long range) and 1 of 1 shooting from the charity stripe. He also grabbed seven rebounds and provided two assists. Yes, he also had the most turnovers of any team, just one worse than Hood-Schifino's similarly abysmal six. But no one is perfect and Olivari's goalscoring abilities are fascinating to say the least.

It remains to be seen how the Lakers plan to move forward with Olivari, but it is still very likely that he will be released and signed to the South Bay Lakers in an affiliate deal. It's also possible that the Lakers decide to forgo a current two-way player and promote Olivari, as he was significantly more impressive than Colin Castleton (who struggled in the game despite his 6-foot-11 frame). to score) or Armel Traore (who managed it). 0 percent of his 1.3 triple attempts per night).

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