Lakers were not ready for the opening of the season, which meant Luka Doncic had to carry a heavier load until LeBron James sat on the bench after being injured in that game against rivals Stephen Curry and the Golden State Warriors.
So, as James recovers from a sciatica injury on his right side, the question is who will fill his void and help Doncic cope with his teammate being out.
The Lakers did not have a full answer Tuesday night. fall 119-109 at the Warriors at Crypto.com Arena, despite Doncic's impressive performance, nearly a triple-double with 43 points, 12 rebounds and nine assists.
James is entering his NBA-record 23rd season, but for the first time in his career he missed the first game of the season.
He sat on the Lakers bench, dressed in a double-breasted suit, cheering on his teammates, offering words of encouragement when needed, knowing it was the only way he could help until he returned to the court in mid-November.
“It's hard to forget about LeBron, (but) the reality is that when you're focused on the group that you have, you've got to make the group work,” coach JJ Redick said afterward. “Sometimes you can just say, 'Oh my God, we're going to bring LeBron back at some point.' Like, that's cool, but you're focused. I'll be honest with you: I had one moment in that first half where we had a couple of possessions and we couldn't get into the zone and I thought, “It would be great to have LeBron.”
Lakers guard Austin Reaves beat Warriors guard Gary Payton II to the game in the second half Friday night.
(Eric Thayer / Los Angeles Times)
When the Lakers came in and put Deandre Ayton at center, he couldn't beat the little Warriors. Ayton had seven touches, scored 10 points and grabbed six rebounds.
But he had four turns. Another problem was that his teammates were trying to get the ball to Ayton. The offense just wasn't working, and that's the main reason the Lakers had 19 turnovers.
“Yeah, I realized today that I'm probably confusing the big (center), whether I can roll and stand in the pocket, it probably makes it a little difficult for them sometimes,” Ayton said. “I'm so used to having such a short guy next to me in the league. Sometimes I can't even finish the shot, and I'll linger a little bit in the free throw zone just to be available to him.”
Austin Reeves showed he was up to the task without James, finishing with 26 points, nine rebounds and five assists.
But by the third quarter, he had committed a team-high five turnovers and committed five fouls.
“We didn’t spend a lot of time together as a group,” Reeves said. “Obviously we're still a work in progress, but we're just going to continue to build and get better and learn to play alongside each other. I mean, I had five turnovers today, and I don't think a couple of them were just stupid. But a couple of them were just miscommunications about where I needed to make a pass to the DA (Deandre Ayton). It wasn't a misread. By it was essentially the wrong pass at the right time. So it’s like learning these little things, and you learn these things on the fly.”
Meanwhile, the Warriors had four players score in double figures and that was the big difference in the game. Jimmy Butler led the Warriors with 31 points, Stephen Curry had 23 and Jonathan Kuminga and Buddy Hield each had 17.
The Lakers collapsed in the third quarter, trailing by 17 points, putting them in catch-up mode.
They lost the third match 35-25. They allowed the Warriors to make 60% of their shots and 50% (five of 10) of their three-pointers.
Even though the Lakers cut that deficit to six points in Game 4, their poor performance in Game 3 doomed them again.
“The trend that I see is that we continue to be a terrible team to start the third quarter,” Redick said. “That was last year. It was the preseason. We've got to rethink some things, and it's, you know, a two-way thing with the guys. What do they need at halftime to make sure they're ready to play? They're not ready to play going into the third quarter.”
Etc.
The Lakers acquired Dalton Knecht for $4.2 million for the 2026-27 season, according to people not authorized to speak publicly on the matter. … The Lakers said forward/center Maxi Kleber has an oblique sprain and will be re-evaluated in two to three weeks.
