LOS ANGELES — The Lakers opened the 2026-27 season with a downtown beatdown. Los Angeles topped the Golden State Warriors 127-105 on Wednesday night at Crypto.com Arena, led by as many as 35 and let a third quarter do the closing argument.
It was the first regular-season game of the post-LeBron era, with nine new players on the roster and a preseason full of unanswered questions. Game 1 of 82 answered most of them.
Curry starts hot, Kessler starts louder
Steph came out hot. He scored 16 in the first quarter, seven made field goals in under eight minutes, and Golden State hung around, trailing just 34-33 after one.
Walker Kessler had the answer. His first bucket came 21 seconds in, an alley-oop off a Luka Dončić pass, and the lobs kept coming.
Dončić fed him three of his four first-quarter makes, and Kessler never slowed down. He finished 12-for-12 from the field with 26 points, nine rebounds and two blocks, and 10 of those 12 makes were dunks.
Luka goes 48 feet
The second quarter ended with a statement. With 1.4 seconds left in the half, Dončić let one fly from 48 feet, and it banked in. Even had some fun and jawed back at rookie Yaxel Lendeborg who had been guarding him the entire first half.
Lakers 66, Warriors 52 at the break.
He had 23 at halftime, 10 of them in the final 2:28 of the quarter, and the Lakers won the period 32-19.
The third quarter was the beatdown
Then came the quarter that earned the headline. The Lakers outscored Golden State 36-16 in the third and turned a 14-point lead into 34. Kessler threw down four dunks in the period, with assists from Austin Reaves, Dončić and Quentin Grimes. Ziaire Williams got in on it too with a running slam off a Matisse Thybulle pass.
Dončić’s 25-foot three with 7:09 left made it 81-57 and put him at 28 points, his last of the night. He sat the entire fourth. The Warriors scored 35 points across the second and third quarters combined.
The glass kept the stars quiet
The talking point all week was rebounding. The Lakers averaged 39.4 boards in the preseason, second-to-last in the league, according to Field Level Media. On Wednesday they pulled down 43 to Golden State’s 36 and owned the defensive glass, 33-21. Dončić grabbed eight, Kessler nine and Kevon Looney five in just under 15 minutes.
The Warriors did claw for 15 offensive rebounds, worth 20 second-chance points, but Los Angeles cleaned up so much on the other end that it hardly mattered. After Curry’s first quarter, his final 23 included seven free throws and no field goals. Draymond Green, playing center with Kristaps Porzingis out, had two points, eight assists, and four turnovers.
Curry and Green combined to shoot 8-for-19 with six turnovers. As a team, Golden State shot 41.3 percent and made just 8 of 36 threes.
Starters hold, bench closes
JJ Redick stuck with Thybulle, Williams, Kessler, Reaves and Dončić, the same group that got outscored 17-8 in its first five minutes together in the preseason finale against Denver. This time it was a completely different story though.
Reaves had 23 points on a perfect 10-for-10 at the line, plus six assists. Dončić finished with 28 points, eight rebounds, seven assists and three steals, and six turnovers he could afford on a night like this.
Off the bench, Grimes had 10 points and four assists. Jake LaRavia added 10 on 4-for-5 shooting. Sandro Mamukelashvili came off the bench again and gave them five points, four rebounds, two assists and two steals in 22 minutes.
What Game 1 answered
It is one game, and Golden State played without Jimmy Butler, Moses Moody, Brandin Podziemski, Charles Bassey and Porzingis. Still, the Lakers took the questions from the preseason and gave real answers. The starting five held. The paint belonged to Los Angeles, 66-56. The rebounding showed up. The turnovers did not vanish, 18 of them, but that is down from 30 in Las Vegas.
New era, new faces, same Luka at the center of it. The Lakers will try to go 2-0 on Friday against the Clippers, but for one night, Crypto belonged to the Lakeshow.
Final: Los Angeles Lakers 127, Golden State Warriors 105
Notable Stats of the Game
Luka Dončić (LAL): 28 points, 8 rebounds, 7 assists
Walker Kessler (LAL): 26 points, 9 rebounds, 2 blocks
Austin Reaves (LAL): 23 points, 4 rebounds, 6 assists
Stephen Curry (GSW): 23 points, 2 rebounds, 1 assist
Brandon Williams (GSW): 14 points, 4 rebounds, 3 assists
Draymond Green (GSW): 2 points, 4 rebounds, 8 assists
Upcoming Game for the Lakers
LA Clippers (1-0) @ Los Angeles Lakers (1-0)
Date: Friday, October 23, 2026
Location: Crypto.com Arena • Los Angeles, CA.
Tip-Off: 7:00 PM PT