The Los Angeles Lakers have been staying afloat in the injury absences of Luka Doncic and LeBron James, thanks in large part to the heroics of Austin Reaves, who followed up back-to-back 40-plus point games with a buzzer-beater on Wednesday evening to beat the Minnesota Timberwolves. Reaves has been playing the best basketball of his career over the last week, but fans are still understandably anxious as to when Doncic and James will return to the lineup.
While James is expected to be out for a while longer, Doncic recently got a positive update on the Lakers' latest injury report ahead of Friday evening's matchup vs the Memphis Grizzlies.
“The Lakers have upgraded Luka Doncic to questionable for tomorrow night’s NBA Cup game,” reported ClutchPoints' NBA insider Brett Siegel on X, formerly Twitter.
Doncic has been dealing with both a left finger sprain and a lower left leg contusion that have kept him out of the lineup. Meanwhile, joining Doncic on the injury report is Marcus Smart, who has missed the last two games but is also listed as questionable for Friday with a right quad contusion. LeBron James, Maxi Kleber, Gabe Vincent, and Aduo Thiero will remain out of the lineup.
A turn of events for the Lakers
While the Los Angeles Lakers already knew that Austin Reaves was capable of putting up All-Star-level numbers when given a first option role, few could have foreseen a scoring output as explosive as the one he has put up in Doncic and James' absence.
Reaves dropped 51 points on the Sacramento Kings on Sunday evening before giving the Portland Trail Blazers 41 points the following evening, and then scored 28 points, dished out 16 assists, and hit the game-winner against the Timberwolves on Wednesday.
This has opened up questions as to whether Reaves will see an expanded role once James and Doncic or healthy, and how he will handle going back to playing off the ball after experiencing so much success on it over the last three games.
In any case, the Lakers and Grizzlies are set to tip off on Friday at 9:30 PM ET.
