The Lakers are desperately looking for any way to salvage the 2025-26 campaign, but things are looking bleak in this final week of the regular season.
Following the loss of Luka Doncic and an MRI that ruled Austin Reaves out for weeks, head coach JJ Redick explained the new approach for his team. Rather than try to compete for a top-three seed, as was the initial goal, Redick just wants the Lakers to do the best they can, knowing that their spot in the top six is secured.
“You obviously have to tackle the situation in front of you,” said Redick, via Daniel Starkand. “We have a unique situation in front of us, and we gotta prepare our team, our group that we have available, to play in a playoff series. That’s how we approach the next four games, how we approach next week leading into Game 1. Like I said, it’s finding who’s gonna be able to play in the playoffs for us. That all goes into it. The seeding part probably went out the window after the OKC game.”
Reaves and Doncic aren’t the only guys down right now. Marcus Smart is currently dealing with an ankle contusion that has cost him the past eight games. JJ said that he’s trending towards a return and should be back in the lineup this week.
“’Trending towards playing at some point this week.’ Redick said the team believed Smart would be back sooner,” wrote McMenamin. “He said that Smart did not have a setback, but took more time with his rehab after initially starting to ramp up towards a return.”
The Lakers had ambitions to win the title this year, but reality has set in fast as the playoffs draw near. With injuries to their top two players, the only star left is 41-year-old LeBron James, who has already been ruled out for today’s game against the Thunder.
At this point, the Lakers are just waiting out the inevitable. Unless they can pull off a miracle and stay alive long enough for Doncic or Reaves to return, the Lakers won’t be seeing their star duo again this season. What that means for JJ is that he can stop setting his goal at a third-place finish in the West. Now, his team can play pressure-free until the end, with an emphasis on survival rather than maximizing efficiency.
Going forward, Redick will be looking to guys like Rui Hachimura, Deandre Ayton, and Marcus Smart (when he returns) to help carry the load, but there’s no hope of getting anywhere meaningful. In the playoffs, against Western juggernauts like the Thunder, Spurs, and Nuggets, the Lakers will be battling against overwhelming odds just to keep pace.
Ultimately, only time will tell how far the Lakers get, but this is hardly the ending they were hoping for. After showing so much promise (over the last few months, especially), the Lakers were looking like a team poised to put up a major fight in the Western bracket. But now, they’ve seemingly thrown in the towel as Redick shifts his goals to utilizing whatever is left of the roster. While failure is never celebrated in Laker land, the team has accepted its situation, knowing that both Reaves and Doncic are out for the count.
