{"id":274004,"date":"2026-04-18T09:28:17","date_gmt":"2026-04-18T09:28:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/274004\/"},"modified":"2026-04-18T09:28:17","modified_gmt":"2026-04-18T09:28:17","slug":"lakers-elevate-playoffs-work-with-luka-doncic-austin-reaves-injured","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/274004\/","title":{"rendered":"Lakers ‘elevate’ playoffs work with Luka Doncic, Austin Reaves injured"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The elephant in the room for the Lakers<\/a> as they enter the playoffs has been, and will continue to be, the status of their starting backcourt, Luka Doncic<\/a> and Austin Reaves<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Both are out because of injuries \u2014 Doncic with a grade 2 left hamstring strain and Reaves with a grade 2 left oblique strain \u2014 and neither is expected to play in the best-of-seven, first-round playoff series against the Houston Rockets<\/a> that begins Saturday at 5:30 p.m. at Crypto.com Arena.<\/p>\n

After practice Friday, coach JJ Redick was quick to say \u201cthere\u2019s not\u201d when asked about an update on Doncic and Reaves.<\/p>\n

After Doncic and Reaves were injured on April 2 at Oklahoma City, the Lakers said both would be out until the end of the regular season. According to people not authorized to speak on the matter, both are expected to be out four to six weeks.<\/p>\n

Doncic went to Spain<\/a> to get treatment, and Reaves has been working diligently in L.A., with the hope that they can return sooner.<\/p>\n

The Lakers miss their combined output of 56.8 points, 13.8 assists and 12.4 rebounds per game. Doncic led the NBA in scoring (33.5) and was third in assists (8.3); he was second on the Lakers in rebounding (7.7).<\/p>\n

During the week of practice, Reaves was around his teammates and seen shooting after a few practices. He appeared to be in good spirits. Doncic was supposed to be back by Friday.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe love having Austin here and we\u2019re glad he is in a position to do his return-to-play [work], however long it takes with us,\u201d Redick said. \u201cExcited to get Luka back and be around the group. Austin and I talk just about every day about different things. So he\u2019s \u2026 just being a part of this. \u2026 <\/p>\n

\u201cThe mindset for our team and for those two guys, like we\u2019re gonna try to make this season as long as possible so that we can get those guys back at some point. We don\u2019t know what that is, and that\u2019s just our job. And their job is to do everything they can to be in a position to come back at some point. It may not work, but that\u2019s what we\u2019re trying to do.\u201d<\/p>\n

The theme of the Lakers\u2019 week at practice was to \u201celevate\u201d their work.<\/p>\n

Yes, they won\u2019t have Doncic and Reaves, but that didn\u2019t mean the Lakers couldn\u2019t work harder.<\/p>\n

When they worked on box-out drills in preparation for the way the Rockets attack the offensive boards, the Lakers went hard. When they watched film and had practice sessions, the Lakers worked with a purpose.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe word we\u2019ve used all week is \u2018elevate.\u2019 I think that\u2019s what it is,\u201d Redick said. \u201cWe all know the playoffs are different. They\u2019re harder. There\u2019s no easy matchups, and you have to be able to elevate your play. But beyond that, it\u2019s elevating your recovery, your attention to detail, your preparation. <\/p>\n

\u201cI talked about that with my coaches as we started this week on Monday morning. It was an off day for the guys, but we were in there for six hours and we\u2019ve all collectively gotta elevate. And particularly when you\u2019re missing two of your top guys, part of elevating is elevating each other and the belief that the group as a whole can be great.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Rockets are a tough and rugged team that is good on defense and at rebounding.<\/p>\n

They ranked fourth in the NBA in points given up (110.0) and tied for fifth in opponents\u2019 field-goal percentage (46.0). They were tops in rebounding (48.1) and offensive rebounds (15.0).<\/p>\n

That has the Lakers\u2019 attention and is why they worked so hard during practice.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s been great. The level of focus and attention to detail, the communication, everything has been elevated,\u201d forward Jarred Vanderbilt said. \u201cWe\u2019ve got a lot of guys that\u2019s been to the playoffs and know what it takes. <\/p>\n

\u201cLike you said, everything elevates around this time and having a veteran group that\u2019s kind of been there and had a taste of the playoffs, we all know what it takes to win games in the playoffs. It\u2019s everybody going out and doing their job and paying attention to the game plan.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The elephant in the room for the Lakers as they enter the playoffs has been, and will continue…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":274005,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[8269,19538,853,18123,7244,6135,7006,48,52,51,1415,47,50,49,8841,1417,7641,2190,7556,430,1968],"class_list":{"0":"post-274004","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-los-angeles","8":"tag-attention","9":"tag-austin-reaves","10":"tag-detail","11":"tag-doncic","12":"tag-group","13":"tag-guy","14":"tag-houston-rockets","15":"tag-la","16":"tag-la-headlines","17":"tag-la-news","18":"tag-lakers","19":"tag-los-angeles","20":"tag-los-angeles-headlines","21":"tag-los-angeles-news","22":"tag-playoff","23":"tag-point","24":"tag-practice","25":"tag-reaves","26":"tag-rebound","27":"tag-week","28":"tag-work"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/274004","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=274004"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/274004\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/274005"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=274004"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=274004"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=274004"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}