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Pau Gasol will not play tonight. Nor will Steves Blake or Nash. The Lakers are hardly in any condition to take on the NBA's best tonight, let alone on the road, but they don't exactly have a choice. Which means we're about to watch either a cover-your-eyes smash job whereby the Thunder reduce the Lakers to a fine dust or a spectacular road upset that turns the season on its head. I know which one I prefer.
OKC is 15-4 and have won 9 of their last 10. Kevin Durant is off to an amazing start to the season. Russell Westbrook, Serge Ibaka and Kevin Martin are playing well also. They're even getting some production out of Hasheem Thabeet. Basically, very little has gone wrong this year for the Thunder, who are clearly the class of the Western Conference at the moment. For them this is the first game of a five-game homestand. For the Lakers it's the end of a three-game road trip. After tonight they return home to face the Jazz on Sunday.