Isaiah Thomas and Julius Randle had to be separated on the Lakers bench
Isaiah Thomas made his first start for the Los Angeles Lakers and the former Celtics star wasted little time in asserting his vocal leadership. Thomas and teammate Julius Randle had to be separated on the bench during Wednesday’s 117-106 loss to Golden State after an on-court argument spilled over into a timeout.
The pair have played well together in the 14 games since Thomas was traded to the Lakers, but that chemistry was nowhere to be found as Lonzo Ball and Brook Lopez stepped in to break up the argument.
“I’m a leader,” Thomas said after the game, per ESPN. “It’s not me getting after anybody, it’s just me leading. If I see something, I’m going to say something, that goes vice versa, if they see something they should say something. That’s just how it’s supposed to be on a basketball team, so there’s no calling nobody out, no getting on nobody, just doing what’s best for this team.”
Lakers coach Luke Walton wasn’t worried about the encounter. He loved it.
“I didn’t see what it was about; I like it though,” Lakers coach Luke Walton said. “I told them afterward, I love it. As long as they’re open-minded and whatever they were arguing about, they get it figured out. We have been trying to get our guys to talk [on defense] all year long and if it is a heated conversation, that means it is two people that are passionate about something and we will take that on our team any day.”
Thomas is averaging 16.7 points per game off the bench in Los Angeles, short of the 28.9 mark he posted last season with the Celtics but two points higher than his average in Cleveland. When asked about the confrontation with Randle, the point guard said it was “nothing.”
“Just two basketball players competing. That’s all it was. Happy to be yelling,” Thomas said. “We want the best for each other, we just want to win. We’re two leaders on the team that we’re competing on and it was a misunderstanding at one point and we talked about it and we’re good. As teammates should.”
Both players are in the final year of their contracts. Against the defending champion Warriors, Randle finished with 22 points and 10 rebounds, while Thomas scored 20 points and added seven assists. Randle said the discussion on the bench was “nothing personal.”
“Ah, man. It was great, honestly,” Randle said. “We expect a lot out of each other and it was just communicating, man. We want to win, we expect to win these games and we expect each other to play at a certain level, so it was just us being teammates. There’s nobody I’d rather go to war with than IT. So it’s nothing personal, we’re just trying to get the best out of each other and win the game.”
