Anaheim, California: Gordon Hayward scored 16 points to lead a balanced offense and the Utah Jazz beat the Los Angeles Lakers 119-86 in a pre-season game Thursday night.
Kobe Bryant had 27 points on 10 for 23 in 28 minutes for the Lakers (1-3). Carlos Boozer scored 17 points and Jordan Hill finished with 12 points and 14 rebounds.
Los Angeles played without 40-year-old Steve Nash after he hurt his back carrying bags on Wednesday at his Manhattan Beach home. Ronnie Price filled took his place and had eight points in 27 minutes. Jeremy Lin (sprained left ankle) also sat out.
The Jazz outscored the Lakers by six points while Bryant was on the court.
Utah led 56-35 at halftime and the Lakers got no closer than 17 the rest of the way. Jack Cooley’s layup extended the Jazz’s lead to 101-71 with 7:22 remaining.
Four-time NBA scoring champion Kevin Durant, last season’s NBA Most Valuable Player, had surgery Thursday on his broken right foot.
The Oklahoma City Thunder said their superstar would be re-evaluated in six weeks.
Durant told Thunder officials on Saturday that he had an aching pain in the foot, and an examination revealed a broken bone at the base of the small toe. Thursday’s operation was performed by foot specialist Robert Anderson in Charlotte, North Carolina.
The team hopes Durant will miss little more than the first month of the 2014-15 season, which starts on October 28.
Durant averaged 32 points, 7.4 rebounds and 5.5 assists a game last season, sparking the Thunder to the Western Conference finals, where they were eliminated by the eventual NBA champion San Antonio Spurs.
Durant, who guided Oklahoma City into the 2012 NBA Finals, where the Thunder were beaten by the Miami Heat, set an Olympic scoring record with 19.5 points a game in 2012 and added 5.8 rebounds, 2.6 assists and 1.6 steals a game to spark the Americans to gold at London.
Durant helped the United States win the 2010 world title, but pulled out of this year’s World Cup squad in August citing mental and physical exhaustion.
After winning last season’s scoring crown, he joined Michael Jordan, Wilt Chamberlain and George Gervin as the only players to win four NBA scoring titles in five years.
