Lonnie Walker scored all of his 15 points in a phenomenal fourth quarter, and the Los Angeles Lakers rallied late to take a 3-1 series lead with a 104-101 victory over the Golden State Warriors in game four on Monday.
LeBron James scored 27 points and Anthony Davis had 23 points and 15 rebounds for the seventh-seeded Lakers, who moved to the brink of an improbable trip to the Western Conference finals with their eighth consecutive home victory since March.
Los Angeles overcame Stephen Curry’s third career postseason triple-double down the stretch largely because of Walker, who has made a seismic impact in returning to the Lakers’ rotation in this series after the former starter was stuck on the bench in recent weeks.
Walker went 6 for 9 in the fourth quarter and hit the go-ahead jumper with 1:53 to play. Curry’s layup with 1:05 left trimmed the Lakers’ lead to one point, but Curry missed two 3-pointers on Golden State’s next possession before Walker made two free throws with 15 seconds to play.
Davis then forced a jump ball in the waning seconds, and it went out of bounds off Curry with 1.3 seconds to play.
Curry had 31 points, 10 rebounds and 14 assists in his 13th career triple-double for the defending champion, which will have to overcome a 3-1 series deficit for only the second time in franchise history to continue its NBA title defence. Golden State also did it in the 2016 Western Conference finals. Game 5 is Wednesday night in San Francisco.
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