On opening night, Luka Doncic, Walker Kessler pairing works beautifully

LOS ANGELES — It worked as envisioned from the opening tip.

Luka Doncic drove the lane, drew three defenders, and Walker Kessler slid behind all of it to the rim and finished an alley-oop.

There was a lot of that all night — Kessler finished with 10 dunks in his Lakers debut, the most dunks in the first game of the season by a Laker since Shaquille O’Neal in 2003. It was just one game — against a shorthanded Golden State frontline — but this was exactly what Rob Pelinka and JJ Redick — not to mention Lakers nation — had dreamed it would look like when they paid a high price to get the big man out of Utah, then paid another high price with a new $130 million contract for the center.

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Kessler finished the night 12-of-12 from the floor for 24 points, and his shot chart says it all.

Kessler understood the assignment.

“Just the way he saw, you know, when I was driving, he stepped up. When I was doubled, he played in the pocket,” Luka Doncic said postgame.

What was Kessler seeing to step up into the right place?

“It’s not what I saw, it’s what Luka and [Austin Reaves] and all the other guys saw, throwing me the ball…” Kessler said. “I wish I could tell you I did something crazy, but I think just being in the right spots and being vertical and just trying to dunk everything — that’s really the biggest thing, is having the attitude and mentality to try to dunk everything.”

These are Doncic’s Lakers now — everything ran through him on offense — and he looked comfortable leading the Lakers to a 127-105 win (that wasn’t that close). Doncic finished with 28 points on 7-of-18 shooting, with eight rebounds and seven assists. The Warriors started with rookie Yaxel Lendeborg on Doncic, and to his credit, he did a respectable job (Doncic shot 1-of-5 in the matchup, according to NBA.com stats), did not back down, and was in Doncic’s face and talking trash. That was his rookie mistake. You don’t want to light a fire under Doncic, or this kind of thing happens.

The Warriors stayed close for a quarter, mostly because Stephen Curry had 16 first-quarter points and was getting free on backcuts. Eventually…

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Publish date : 2026-10-22 06:00:00

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