The Los Angeles Lakers avoided being swept on Saturday with a 119-108 win over the Denver Nuggets in Game 4, which broke an 11-game losing L.A. losing streak against Denver.
In other playoff action, the Orlando Magic evened their series with the Cleveland Cavaliers at 2-2 with a 112-89 victory that saw them outscore Cleveland by a whopping 27 points in the third quarter to flip the nine-point lead Cleveland took into halftime.
The Oklahoma City Thunder went up 3-0 on the New Orleans Pelicans with a 106-85 win on Saturday, and the Boston Celtics bounced back from a surprising Game 2 loss to the Miami Heat with a 104-84 win to go up 2-1 in that series.
Lakers finally finish what they start
The Lakers have held the lead for 136 minutes in this series, while the Nuggets have led for just 42 minutes. The Lakers have held a double-digit lead in all four games, and they have led all four games after the first quarter and two of the games at halftime, including Saturday's affair. They finally closed one in Game 4 as the series shifts back to Denver for Game 5 on Monday.
It begs the question: Have the Lakers actually been the better team for most of this series or has Denver just been playing with its food through the first three quarters? I would argue a little bit of both. L.A. has gotten extraordinary performances out of Anthony Davis and LeBron James, who combined for 55 points Saturday. Davis had 25 points and 23 rebounds alone. D'Angelo Russell and Austin Reaves had 21 each.
This series could very easily be tied 2-2, at the very least, had the Lakers managed to hang onto just one of those big leads. If this thing was 2-2, we would be having a very different conversation. But it isn't. And now the Lakers are faced with having to become the first team in history to recover from a 3-0 deficit to win a best-of-seven series. It's not going to happen, and it's going to cloud what has actually been a pretty damn impressive showing from L.A. against the defending champs.
Celtics reestablish dominance in Miami
The Celtics played a nearly perfect game on Saturday, following the blueprint for how Joe Mazzulla wants to win this series. They led from wire to wire, playing with more pace offensively and more force defensively. The scariest part is that Boston actually made fewer 3-pointers in Game 3 than it did in their Game 2 loss, and still won by 20.
That means there's significant room for improvement if they have a hot shooting night – which they will, eventually. One of the keys for the Celtics was Kristaps Porzingis, who bounced back from a downright awful Game 2 performance to put up 18 points, five rebounds and two blocks on 3-for-5 3-point shooting. The big man looked engaged early, and the Celtics made an active effort to get him involved.
Defensively, Boston took out the head of the snake early, as Tyler Herro finished with 15 points and just two assists (he had a career-high 14 assists in Game 2) on 5-for-16 shooting.
For the Heat, there's not a whole lot they can take away from a game like this, and they may just flush it altogether. They had success limiting Boston's 3-point barrage, but that resulted in 42 points in the paint for the Celtics. Ultimately, though, Erik Spoeltstra has to be happy if his team can hold the league's best offense to 104 points.
The problems came on the other side, where they simply ran out of playmaking once Herro was taken out of rhythm. They're not going to make 23 3-pointers every night as they did in Game 2, but they need guys like Duncan Robinson (zero 3-point attempts in seven minutes) and Caleb Martin (two 3-point attempts in 38 minutes) to have an impact from beyond the arc if they're going to have a chance in this series.
OKC is smothering McCollum, Ingram
Without Zion Williamson, New Orleans needed a big series from at least one of C.J. McCollum or Brandon Ingram, and probably from both. That hasn't happened.
McCollum, who shot 7-for-22 in Game 3, is averaging 17 points on 38% shooting. He's 5-for-22 from 3. Ingram is averaging a way-too-quiet 16 points on 41% shooting.
OKC is just too good for New Orleans to have any chance with its best two shot makers going like this, though it would be disingenuous to suggest these are just random bad games. OKC's defense is legit. Between Lu Dort, Jalen Williams, Cason Wallace and even Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, who is long and instinctive, everywhere you look is a brick of a defender squeezing the life out of New Orleans' offense.
OKC has dominated Games 2 and 3, winning by a total of 53 points. The only game that was winnable for New Orleans was the opener, which OKC pulled out by two on a late SGA jumper. Turns out, the Pelicans really needed that one if they were going to make this is a series. Now it's a formality.
No Banchero, no problem
The Orlando Magic already struggle to score, so on paper, it should be virtually impossible for them to win a game in which their best player, Paolo Banchero, scores just nine points, but not only did they defeat the Cavs in Game 4 to tie the series 2-2 despite Banchero shooting just 4-for-14, they won by 23 points. Here's how:
- Franc Wagner was sensational: 34 points (11-17 FG, 2-3 3PT, 1-1 FT), 13 rebounds, 4 assists, 1 block, 0 turnovers in 40 minutes.
- Jonathan Isaac was also terrific: 14 points (5-7 FG, 4-6 3PT), 7 rebounds, 1 assist, 1 steal, 2 blocks in 20 minutes.
Those two guys going 6-for-9 from deep is the kind of unexpected production a team like Orlando needs to put up enough offense on a quiet Banchero night. Orlando, which turned a nine-point halftime deficit into a rout with a 37-10 third-quarter wiping, outscored Cleveland by 24 points from beyond the arc.
NBA playoffs scores: Saturday, April 27
- Game 4: Magic 112, Cavaliers 89 (Series tied 2-2) -- Recap
- Game 3: Thunder 106, Pelicans 85 (OKC leads 3-0) -- Recap
- Game 3: Celtics 104, Heat 84 (BOS leads 2-1) -- Recap
- Game 4: Lakers 119, Nuggets 109 (DEN leads 2-1) -- Recap
CBS Sports provided live updates, analysis and highlights throughout Saturday's slate. Follow along below.
