The Portland Trail Blazers took down the undermanned Los Angeles Lakers 132-116 at Moda Center on Saturday. The Lakers were without a host of big names against the Trail Blazers, and head coach JJ Redick stated postgame that this has been the story of their season.
“This has been like the normal all season,” Redick said. “… We’ve won some games. We’ve actually beaten a bunch of good teams. You play a team the second time around sometimes, and you rewatch the game, and you’re like, “Oh s***, we didn’t have Austin [Reaves] that game,’ or ‘We didn’t have Luka [Doncic] that game,’ or ‘We didn’t have Rui [Hachimura] that game,’ or ‘We didn’t have [Deandre Ayton] that game.’
“So, this has just been our season,” Redick continued. “And look, every team’s going through it. I’m not trying to say we’re singled out, but you know, this has been our season. You get one guy healthy, and another guy gets injured. You get one guy back, another guy gets injured. Two guys go out. Tonight, you play without your two centers. So, just been our season.”
The Lakers were without Luka Doncic (left groin soreness), Austin Reaves (left calf strain), Deandre Ayton (left knee soreness), Jaxson Hayes (left hamstring tendinopathy), and Adou Thiero (right MCL sprain) here. Doncic, Reaves, and Thiero had already been ruled out on Friday, with Ayton and Hayes joining them on the sidelines the day of the game.
With their starting and backup center out, Redick was forced to hand Maxi Kleber his first start as a Laker. Kleber was unsurprisingly powerless to prevent the visitors from getting demolished on the glass here.
The Trail Blazers won the rebounding battle 42-27 on the night. They hauled in 12 offensive rebounds and turned them into 27 second-chance points. Would the presence of Ayton or Hayes have led to the outcome being any different here? It’s hard to say.
As for Redick’s point about his players missing time, he has indeed had to deal with too many injuries. This was the 40th game the Lakers have played this season, and three of their five full-time starters have featured in 30 or fewer.
Reaves and LeBron James have played 23 games each, while Rui Hachimura has suited up for 30 of them. As for Doncic and Ayton, they have played 32 and 35 games, respectively.
Life isn’t easy for a coach when there isn’t continuity, but as Redick acknowledged, he isn’t the only one who has had to deal with this. There are a fair few teams around the NBA who have had big guns miss time.
While the outcome here wasn’t what Redick wanted, he stated there were things he liked from his players when asked for his takeaways.
“Some good things,” Redick said. “We did a couple things defensively to try out with Drew [Timme] at the five, and, in a shock, we played more zone tonight. There was some really good stuff out of that. And I thought our competitive spirit was really high and had some guys that really, really stepped up, starting with Maxi and Drew. I thought those guys were great.
“[Marcus] Smart was a warrior,” Redick added. “LeBron, after a slow start, got it going, and Rui made some shots. There’s some good stuff to take away from tonight.”
Marcus Smart and Jake LaRavia had injury scares in this one as well, but Redick didn’t appear too concerned about them postgame. Smart had a team-high 25 points on the night, but despite his efforts, the Lakers have now dropped to 24-16 on the season and are sixth in the West. They are in danger of falling into the play-in spots after getting off to a 15-4 start.
We’ll see the Lakers in action next against the Toronto Raptors at Crypto.com Arena on Sunday at 9:30 PM ET.
