{"id":467432,"date":"2026-02-09T00:25:08","date_gmt":"2026-02-09T00:25:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/467432\/"},"modified":"2026-02-09T00:25:08","modified_gmt":"2026-02-09T00:25:08","slug":"lebron-james-leads-lakers-past-warriors-luka-doncic-sits","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/467432\/","title":{"rendered":"LeBron James leads Lakers past Warriors; Luka Doncic sits"},"content":{"rendered":"

p]:text-cms-story-body-color-text clearfix”> <\/p>\n

The Lakers introduced newly acquired guard Luke Kennard<\/a> on Saturday and also discussed relatively good news about Luka Doncic\u2019s injury<\/a> and how long he\u2019ll be out.<\/p>\n

The Lakers<\/a> said Doncic was diagnosed with a mild left hamstring strain and will be day to day before the All-Star guard sat out the team\u2019s 105-99 win<\/a> over the Golden State Warriors at Crypto.com Arena. LeBron James<\/a> led the Lakers with 20 points, 10 assists and seven rebounds.<\/p>\n

The Lakers host Oklahoma City on Monday night, San Antonio on Tuesday night and Dallas on Thursday night. All-Star Weekend follows, and the Lakers don\u2019t play again until Feb. 20 against the Clippers at home.<\/p>\n

So coach JJ Redick<\/a> and president of basketball operations Rob Pelinka were asked if Doncic would be able to play in the All-Star Game or if it would be best for him to rest.<\/p>\n

\"Lakers <\/p>\n

Lakers forward Jarred Vanderbilt battles Warriors guard Brandin Podziemski for a loose ball at Crypto.com Saturday.<\/p>\n

(Gina Ferazzi\/Los Angeles Times)<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve been around him as a teammate and as a coach and I know he plays. If he\u2019s able to play, he plays. I think he wants to be in the All-Star Game,\u201d Redick said. \u201cI know he wants to play against Dallas, the game before the All-Star Game. He has his team working on him day and night. So again, it\u2019s day to day and when he\u2019s ready to play, we\u2019ll get him out there.\u201d<\/p>\n

Doncic, who leads the NBA in scoring (32.8 ppg) and is second in assists (8.6), earned the most All-Star votes. In the new format of \u201cU.S. vs. the World,\u201d Doncic would play for the world team because he\u2019s from Slovenia.<\/p>\n

\u201cLuka, one of his greatest qualities is when he has an injury or he\u2019s unavailable for a game, he is deeply upset,\u201d said Pelinka, who spoke to the media for the first time since September. \u201cHe just can\u2019t stand not playing basketball. He loves the game so much and wants to play every night. And that\u2019s an incredible quality. Just a player who\u2019s like fighting and clawing to play versus looking for a reason maybe not to. So we commend Luka for that. In terms of this injury, the good news is it doesn\u2019t appear to be anything serious. It was a mild hamstring strain and he is truly day to day.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Lakers and Warriors faced off in a nationally televised game without stars Doncic and Stephen Curry<\/a> (knee). The Lakers pulled off the win with six players scoring in double figures.<\/p>\n

\"Lakers <\/p>\n

Lakers center Jaxson Hayes (11) scores in front of Warriors forward Draymond Green at Crypto.com Arena on Saturday.<\/p>\n

(Gina Ferazzi\/Los Angeles Times)<\/p>\n

Rui Hachimura<\/a> had 18 points on seven-for-10 shooting, and Austin Reaves<\/a> had 16 points, eight assists and five rebounds in 24 minutes off the bench.<\/p>\n

Kennard<\/a>, acquired Thursday from the Atlanta Hawks for Gabe Vincent, played his role well. He had 10 points in his first game as a Laker, coming off the bench to go four for seven from the field and two for four from beyond the three-point line. He also had two assists and two rebounds.<\/p>\n

Kennard impressed James with his play.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt showed tonight, obviously. I mean, some of the ones that he had when he was driving, penetrating, kickout, some of them we didn\u2019t make, but it\u2019s just a great basketball play,\u201d James said. \u201cSo, it\u2019s going to help us have another ballhandler, for sure. But then his shooting, how elite his shooting is, is going to help us as well, tremendously.\u201d<\/p>\n

Kennard drilled a three-pointer off a pass from Reaves to give the Lakers a 92-88 lead in the fourth quarter. After Reaves scored, Kennard showed off his passing skills, finding Jarred Vanderbilt under the basket for a dunk. Maxi Kleber scored and Reaves made four free throws down the stretch to help seal the win for the Lakers (32-19).<\/p>\n

Kennard quickly got a glimpse of what life will be like playing with the Lakers\u2019 big three of Doncic, James and Reaves.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s huge to play in a place like this, I mean, the biggest stage in basketball,\u201d Kennard said. \u201cIt\u2019s something special and I think for me, expectation was obviously getting a win. That\u2019s the biggest thing at the end of the day. For me, just to be aggressive out there, try to make plays when I can and have an impact with the shooting, passing, screening, anything it is, that was my expectation for myself. And that was really good.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"p]:text-cms-story-body-color-text clearfix”> The Lakers introduced newly acquired guard Luke Kennard on Saturday and also discussed relatively good news…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":467433,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[574],"tags":[64,63,726,1545,239010,239008,34255,1862,3899,239007,239009,2873,11473,93338,35062,38921,15624,85,3018],"class_list":["post-467432","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-basketball","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-basketball","tag-day","tag-first-point","tag-first-shot","tag-first-time","tag-game","tag-injury","tag-kennard","tag-laker-debut","tag-lakers","tag-luka-doncic","tag-nba-all-star-game","tag-night","tag-pelinka","tag-player","tag-sports","tag-team"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/467432","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=467432"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/467432\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/467433"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=467432"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=467432"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=467432"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}