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OAKLAND – Kevin Durant sauntered up to the podium with a pleasing smile that indicated he won. The Warriors’ forward then spoke in a tone that suggested he felt relieved.

After all, the Golden State Warriors escaped with a 113-106 victory over the Los Angeles Lakers on Friday at Oracle Arena. Yet, the Warriors seemed fully aware of the short-term and long-term implications.

When it comes to bottom-line results, the Warriors (26-6) secured a season-high 11th consecutive win and held off nearly squandering a 23-point lead because of a distinguishable quality.

“We’re just more experienced than them,” said Durant, who had 33 points on 9-of-20 shooting. “We know how to play and what plays to run.”

When it comes to big-picture analysis, however, the Warriors secured their third victory this season against the Lakers (11-19) fully realizing what awaits.

“After so many tight games, they’re going to start to figure it out,” Durant said of the Lakers. “It’s going to be scary. I’m glad we got them out the way.”

While the NBA has spread out its 82-game schedule, the league clumped together three matchups between the Lakers and Warriors in the first two months of the season. The Warriors needed overtime to prevail in two of them, and a late-game correction in the latest one.

In all three, Warriors rookie forward Jordan Bell observed that the Lakers played with a league-leading pace that mirrored the former Loyola Maramount teams coached by Paul Westhead in the 1990’s. The Warriors do not have to see the Lakers again until March 14, 2018, but by then the Warriors suggested the challenge will become heftier. Hence, Warriors coach Steve Kerr said Lakers coach Luke Walton “is doing a good job” in his second season after serving the previous two seasons as a Warriors assistant.

“They’re a very scrappy team and very young,” Bell said. “They play really hard and in transition. They’re always running.”

So after the Warriors held a 71-48 lead with 8:21 left in the third quarter, the Lakers exerted those qualities Bell mentioned to respond with a 41-17 run. The Lakers took their first lead of the game when guard Kentavious Caldwell-Pope and forward Julius Randle made consecutive 3-pointers for a 89-88 advantage with 7:41 remaining. The Warriors also committed 10 of their 15 turnovers in the final period.

“The whole team relaxed,” Warriors forward Draymond Green said. “Once we relaxed, they got going. It’s the NBA. Once you let a team get going, it was a little rough.”

Lakers rookie forward Kyle Kuzma posted 27 points on 9-of-16 shooting, two nights after posting 38 points in a win over Houston. Randle added 21 points in 24 minutes off the bench. And after fielding season-long criticism for his shooting accuracy and stroke, Lakers rookie guard Lonzo Ball scored 24 points, while shooting 9-of-16 from the field and 5-of-6 from 3-point range and adding five assists.

Ball may have averaged 10 points and 7.0 assists, while shooting only 35 percent from the field and 29.6 percent from 3-point range. In three games against Golden State, though, Ball has held steady with his assists (7.0), while exceeding his season-averages in points (18.3), field-goal percentage (50 percent) and 3-point shooting (57.9 percent).

“Lonzo Ball likes to shoot against us. Apparently he can’t shoot against anybody else, but he shoots against us,” Kerr joked. “Every time we play against them it seems like people pregame are saying, ‘What’s wrong with his shot?’ I don’t know. He makes all of his threes against us. I really like him. He’s a really good player. He generates a beautiful tempo and pace to the game and is unselfish.”

That play paid off when Ball made a bank shot that cut the Warriors’ lead to 99-97 with 3:56 left. The Warriors, however, relied on their talent and experience to secure the win.

The Warriors held the Lakers scoreless for a nearly two-minute stretch as they missed their next four shots. Nearly everyone from Klay Thompson (16 points), Green, Durant and Bell made shots to cement a 14-9 run.

“When you got young talent like that that always plays hard, they can’t necessarily pull all the games out. The majority of them they probably won’t pull the game out, just because when you’re lacking that experience, you don’t know what play to go to down the stretch,” Green said. “With that team, they’re always looking to run and get up and down the floor. Sometimes you’re looking over to the side because you don’t know necessarily what to call. Sometimes they just make some basic mistakes. With experience, you don’t make those mistakes.”

Despite the Warriors’ own mistakes, they had enough talent to overcome such issues.

Durant posted at least 30 points in the fourth time in the past seven games. Bell added a career-high 20 points on 9-of-13 shooting and 10 rebounds, while starting for the first time with Durant and Green. Though Green admitted fatigue caught up to him after missing five of the previous six games with a sore right shoulder, he added 13 points on 4-of-9 shooting, 11 rebounds and seven assists. Despite going scoreless and not playing in crunch time as he usually does, Warriors forward Andre Iguodala returned with enough defensive intensity after nursing the flu this week.

“It’s huge,” Kerr said. “I don’t think we win that game without Andre and Draymond and number of players we have available.”

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On Nov. 29, Warriors guard Stephen Curry scored 13 of his 28 points and made all three of his shot attempts in overtime. That happened after Curry went 6-of-17 from the field in regulation stemmed from an injured right ring finger. Durant then added 29 points on 12-of-25 shooting, seven rebounds and five assists without any signs of any pain with his previously sprained ankles. On Monday, Durant carried the Warriors in different circumstances. Though he went 10-of-29 from the field, Durant scored 12 of his 36 points in overtime.

Those results left the Warriors nursing mixed feelings. They seemed comfortable with the present. They sounded concerned about the future.

“Sometimes you can’t close the game out because of that youth, but two or three years down the line it might be a different story,” Green said. “It’s fun to watch them and fun to play against them. Coming up, probably sooner rather than later, they’re going to be a force to be reckoned with.”