{"id":656675,"date":"2026-05-08T01:13:12","date_gmt":"2026-05-08T01:13:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/656675\/"},"modified":"2026-05-08T01:13:12","modified_gmt":"2026-05-08T01:13:12","slug":"luka-doncic-game-2-status-for-lakers-vs-okc-announced","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/656675\/","title":{"rendered":"Luka Doncic Game 2 status for Lakers vs. OKC announced"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Luka Doncic has been ruled out for Game 2 against the Oklahoma City Thunder with a Grade 2 hamstring strain, while Jarred Vanderbilt is doubtful with a finger injury, and Luke Kennard is questionable due to a neck issue.<\/p>\n<p>The <a href=\"https:\/\/basketnews.com\/teams\/357-los-angeles-lakers.html\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Los Angeles Lakers<\/a> will once again be without superstar <a href=\"https:\/\/basketnews.com\/players\/18340-luka-doncic.html\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Luka Doncic<\/a> for Game 2 against the Oklahoma City Thunder on Thursday night.<\/p>\n<p>Doncic has officially been ruled out with a Grade 2 hamstring strain and will miss his eighth playoff game this season.<\/p>\n<p>There is still no clear timetable for his return, although the <a href=\"https:\/\/basketnews.com\/news-246643-realistic-luka-doncic-return-date-revealed-by-doctor.html\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">best-case scenario could be Game 4<\/a>. Doncic suffered the injury during the third quarter of the Lakers&#8217; loss to Oklahoma City on April 2.<\/p>\n<p>One positive sign is that Doncic has resumed running, marking an important step in his recovery process.<\/p>\n<p>However, he has not yet been cleared for full-contact activity, meaning he is still not close to returning to game action.<\/p>\n<p>Speaking on Wednesday, Doncic revealed that doctors initially gave him an eight-week recovery timeline.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m just doing everything I can,&#8221; Luka said. &#8220;Every day I&#8217;m doing stuff I&#8217;m supposed to do. You know, obviously recovering now, working. Like I said, doctors said eight weeks at the beginning of the first time around. So, you know, I&#8217;m just going day by day, and I feel better every day.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p> <img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/image-469770-any718x552.jpg\" title=\"\" alt=\"\" border=\"0\"\/><\/p>\n<p>Credit AP &#8211; Scanpix<\/p>\n<p>Doncic also confirmed that he traveled to Spain for platelet-rich plasma (PRP) injections in an effort to speed up his recovery.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I went to Spain to do PRP,&#8221; the NBA scoring champion told reporters. &#8220;Everybody knows that it&#8217;s one of the best countries to do that. Obviously, you know, we talked with the Lakers doctors, so everybody agreed for me to go there.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Lakers head coach JJ Redick emphasized that the team will not rush Doncic back.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s very simple. It&#8217;s when he&#8217;s ready to play, he should play,&#8221; Redick said. &#8220;That comes with the athlete having confidence. It&#8217;s no different from Austin [Reaves].&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>The Lakers dropped Game 1 to the top-seeded Thunder, 108-90, on Tuesday.<\/p>\n<p>If Doncic is unable to accelerate his recovery, he could miss the entire series and potentially part of the Western Conference Finals if Los Angeles advances.<\/p>\n<p>Game 2 will also take place in Oklahoma City. In addition to Doncic, Jarred Vanderbilt (finger) is listed as doubtful, while Luke Kennard (neck) is questionable for Thursday&#8217;s matchup.<\/p>\n<p>                                                    <a href=\"https:\/\/basketnews.com\/plus?utm_source=basketnews_com&amp;utm_medium=bn_plus&amp;utm_id=UA-259273-31&amp;utm_campaign=banners_free_content_for_not_members_bottom_2\" class=\"banners_paid_content_info_block_white banners-paid-content-info-block-white\" data-google-interstitial=\"false\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><\/p>\n<p>                                                <img decoding=\"async\" class=\"bn-plus-img img-fluid\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/bn-plus.png\" alt=\"\"\/><\/p>\n<p>                                            Subscribe to BN+ and get access to exclusive content.<\/p>\n<p>                                                            <\/a><\/p>\n<p>                                If you like our content, please <a href=\"https:\/\/www.google.com\/preferences\/source?q=basketnews.com\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">click here<\/a> and add us as your preferred source. It helps us a lot, and we are committed to delivering you the very latest basketball news.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Luka Doncic has been ruled out for Game 2 against the Oklahoma City Thunder with a Grade 2&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":656676,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[574],"tags":[64,63,726,85],"class_list":["post-656675","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-basketball","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-basketball","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/656675","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=656675"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/656675\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/656676"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=656675"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=656675"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=656675"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}