Los Angeles Lakers head coach JJ Redick was infuriated with the missed call on Luka Doncic in Game 4. While addressing the 113-116 loss during the postgame press conference, Redick shared a statement on the officiating for the game.
“Let us just start with Luka got tripped. That was a blatant trip. He doesn’t just fall on his own,” said Redick, concerning the missed foul call on Minnesota Timberwolves forward Jaden McDaniels.
“We watched it. He gets tripped. So we should have been at the free-throw line. It’s not an excuse for why we lost, but he got fouled.”
The play in context was one of many debatable foul calls from Game 4 of the Lakers-Wolves series. For what seemed to depict the nature of officiating for the game, the Lakers’ head coach very clearly expressed his thoughts on the “missed” foul call on Doncic.
Luka Doncic got tripped, no call pic.twitter.com/BExKpTEd06
— Tedd Buddwell 🏀🏈 (@TedBuddy8) April 27, 2025
By looking at the play itself, it is evident that McDaniels plants his foot down first. Although his intent may not be to trip Doncic, the result is still fairly clear. Contextually, it is understandable why Redick was furious with the officials.
However, this wasn’t the only crucial call that dictated the outcome of the game. In the dying moments of the game, Lakers forward LeBron James stripped Anthony Edwards, and the ball was called out of bounds in favor of Minnesota.
A coach’s challenge from Minnesota was intended to secure possession. The call was reviewed and changed to a personal foul on James, with two shots being awarded to Edwards. The Lakers star commented upon this during the postgame press conference, but his resignation with the officiating was clear from his tone.
Even with all these “controversial” elements taken into consideration, Redick was still clear in establishing that these calls were not the reasons for the Lakers losing Game 4.
The Lakers’ execution, on both ends of the floor, fell off dramatically in the fourth. Restricted to scoring 19 points by Minnesota’s defense, the Purple and Gold saw very limited production from their players.
James himself had notched zero points in the fourth quarter. Meanwhile, Doncic struggled to convert on most of his attempts, as he even came up short on a crucial layup attempt.
The Lakers looked tired by the end of the fourth. Redick had played the second-half starters for the entire 24 minutes, and the fatigue is an obvious outcome of this. Unfortunately, given the connotations of this game, the Lakers would have benefited from showing more resilience.
Poor decision-making and impatience resulted in the loss, which sees the series score at 3-1 in Minnesota’s favor. With the series heading back to Los Angeles, the Lakers will hope to kickstart their comeback effort with a win in Game 5 on Wednesday at 10 pm ET.
