The Celtics' veteran leader took a long, winding road to his first NBA title, and he's reaping the rewards of his patience.

Before meeting James for the first time this season, with the Boston Celtics and Los Angeles Lakers set to clash Thursday, Horford shared the lessons he learned from the superstar, his perspective on James’ remarkable longevity and his thoughts on James’ longtime domination of the Eastern Conference.

On Thursday night, the Boston Celtics had a tough 117-96 loss to the Los Angeles Lakers (in California). Kristaps Porzingis finished his night with 22 points,

Sitting out Wednesday

The postseason statistics for Al Horford are provided in this article, for those who want to know how he has performed in the playoffs in his NBA career. Playoff stats: 186 GP | 12.2 PPG | 8.0 RPG | 3.2 APG

Anthony Davis, LeBron James and Austin Reaves lead the way as the Lakers make 11 3-pointers during a dominant first half and dismiss the defending champs, 117-96.

Horford (toe) is listed as questionable for Wednesday's game versus the Clippers, Taylor Snow of the Celtics' official site reports. Horford has consistently sat out one of leg of Boston's back-to-backs this seasons.

Boston has been inconsistent for weeks — a stark difference from last season’s joyride — but is still among the best defending NBA champions of this century.

Kristaps Porzingis isn't worried about the Celtics' play after their loss to the Lakers dropped their record to 10-9 in their last 19 games.

Also, after not losing a single game by double digits from the start of the season through the end of December, the Celtics have since suffered defeats of 13, 13, 17 and 21 points, all in their last 10 games. Those also were the only games this season in which Boston failed to score 100 points.

The Boston Celtics got key contributions from the bench guys as they narrowly best the Los Angeles Clippers 117-113 in overtime.