Sweet Lou helps Clippers trim LeBron-less Lakers

Clippers guard Lou Williams puts a shot up against the Lakers’ Josh Hart. AP

LOS ANGELES—Even while playing without LeBron James on the tail end of a back-to-back set, the Los Angeles Lakers managed to carve out a double-digit lead in the third quarter against the Los Angeles Clippers.

That’s when the Clippers’ four toughest defenders clamped down and Sweet Lou went wild to win this basketball-loving city’s first rivalry game of the season.

Lou Williams had a season-high 36 points and the Clippers scored 22 consecutive points during the second half of a 118-107 victory over the depleted Lakers on Friday night.

Danilo Gallinari added 19 points and 10 rebounds for the Clippers, who held the Lakers without a field goal for more than six minutes while matching the longest unanswered scoring run by any team in the NBA this season.

“We were just a little sluggish,” Williams said. “We were just a step slow. We knew they were on a back-to-back, but for whatever reason, we just weren’t playing our best until we put a good stretch together in the third and then busted the game wide open in the fourth.”

The Clippers turned a seven-point deficit into a 15-point lead early in the fourth quarter of their fourth win in five games. Williams torched his former team yet again, scoring 23 points in the second half, yet the game turned with the suffocating defense played by Patrick Beverley, Montrezl Harrell, Avery Bradley and Sindarius Thornwell during that 22-0 run. —AP