{"id":592175,"date":"2026-04-18T17:54:09","date_gmt":"2026-04-18T17:54:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/592175\/"},"modified":"2026-04-18T17:54:09","modified_gmt":"2026-04-18T17:54:09","slug":"lebron-james-urges-lakers-to-rebound-against-rockets-in-playoff-opener","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/592175\/","title":{"rendered":"LeBron James Urges Lakers to Rebound Against Rockets in Playoff Opener"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Los Angeles Lakers<\/a> will open their first-round playoff series against the Houston Rockets<\/a> on Saturday. Ahead of Game 1, Lakers superstar LeBron James<\/a> issued a blunt message to his team.<\/p>\n

The Lakers enter the 2026 postseason without two key players, Luka Doncic<\/a> and Austin Reaves<\/a>. Both are out with injuries and are not expected to return for the first-round series. That leaves Los Angeles<\/a> without its two top scorers, putting more pressure on James.<\/p>\n

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The 41-year-old NBA<\/a> icon is expected to lead the team\u2019s offense and create scoring chances for teammates. However, the bigger concern is controlling rebounds. The Rockets were the best rebounding team in the NBA during the regular season.<\/p>\n

\"LosLos Angeles Lakers forward LeBron James against the Dallas<\/a> Mavericks.Kevin Jairaj-Imagn Images<\/p>\n

Houston led the league with 48.1 total rebounds and 15.0 offensive rebounds per game. The Lakers, by contrast, ranked as the fourth-worst rebounding team at 41.0 per game.<\/p>\n

On Thursday, James stressed the challenge with a strong comparison. The four-time NBA champion told reporters the Rockets are \u201cthe best rebounding team in the last 25 years.\u201d He then issued a strong message to his squad.<\/p>\n

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\u201cThe message is, get your [expletive] in there, box out and rebound,\u201d James said after practice. \u201cDon\u2019t need to have a message. We\u2019re all grown men. Do your job.\u201d<\/p>\n

The first-round Western Conference series features the Lakers and Rockets as the No. 4 and No. 5 seeds, respectively. The Lakers finished 53-29, while the Rockets closed at 52-30 in the 2026 standings.<\/p>\n

The matchup also highlights a clash<\/a> between All-Star forwards and future Hall of Famers in James and Kevin Durant<\/a>. The 37-year-old Rockets star moved up to fifth on the NBA\u2019s all-time scoring list this season. James remains the NBA\u2019s all-time leading scorer.<\/p>\n

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The two renew their long postseason history in a high-stakes series. After early playoff exits last year, both the Lakers and Rockets look to rebound. Each franchise aims for a better outcome this time.<\/p>\n

For James, how the Lakers perform on the boards could set the tone for the series.<\/p>\n

Related: Draymond Green Responds to LeBron James’ Strong Message<\/a><\/p>\n

This story was originally published by Athlon Sports<\/a> on Apr 18, 2026, where it first appeared in the NBA<\/a> section. Add Athlon Sports as a Preferred Source by clicking here.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Los Angeles Lakers will open their first-round playoff series against the Houston Rockets on Saturday. Ahead of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":592176,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[64],"tags":[11654,1062,5050,5556,3013,3031,1055,3014,355,99],"class_list":{"0":"post-592175","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nba","8":"tag-austin-reaves","9":"tag-dallas","10":"tag-houston-rockets","11":"tag-kevin-durant","12":"tag-lebron-james","13":"tag-los-angeles","14":"tag-los-angeles-lakers","15":"tag-luka-doncic","16":"tag-nba","17":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/592175","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=592175"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/592175\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/592176"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=592175"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=592175"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=592175"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}