BOSTON — In seasons of struggle, the Lakers’ trip to Boston produced the kind of crowd noise that could match a smartwatch alarm. In seasons such as this one, where a June rematch isn’t hard to fathom, the decibels only go up.
But no amount of noise, no amount of tradition, no amount of atmosphere could save the Lakers from a future that instantly became uncertain when LeBron James sustained a groin strain during the Lakers’ 111-101 loss to Boston on Saturday night.
As the Lakers worked to come back from a 22-point deficit in the fourth quarter, James signaled to the Lakers bench for a timeout, the 40-year-old star grabbing at the inside of his left leg. As the Lakers’ huddled, James gingerly tried to stretch his groin muscle before walking across the court to meet with his trainer, Mike Mancias. James grimaced, frustratingly put his hands on his hips and slowly walked back to the locker room.
James downplayed the severity, though he acknowledged he didn’t know for sure.
“Not much concern,” James said. “Obviously, we go day to day, look at it each day, see if it gets better, and take the proper measurements to see what we need to do going forward.”
The injury came as the Lakers scrambled back into the game following a disastrous third quarter when they scored just four points in the first seven minutes.
“We were atrocious offensively,” Austin Reaves said of that stretch.
James strained his groin with seven minutes left in the fourth, scoring after a string of spin moves in the paint. He jogged on the court and quickly signaled for the timeout. He’s had a history with groin injuries since joining the Lakers, most significantly tearing the muscle on Christmas in 2019. He missed more than a month after that injury.
“It’s not as bad as that,” James said.
The Lakers were able to get within four in the final five minutes before the Celtics hit the game’s biggest shots.
Boston All-Stars Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown combined for 71 points, with Tatum scoring 40. After the game, the Lakers and coach JJ Redick said they were pleased with their defensive effort even without Jaxson Hayes, who missed the game with a knee contusion.
“Frankly, I thought we defended well tonight. Missing Jaxson and not being able to have him roam off of [Jrue] Holliday, I think, hurt a little bit with the room protection, but we forced them into a lot of off-the-dribble jumpers after the first quarter,” Redick said. “We wanted to limit their threes. They shot 38 threes. They averaged 48. Tatum and Brown, for those guys, they played 42 minutes and 46 minutes and both took over 25 shots — like, we executed well defensively on a lot of things.”
And although Luka Doncic finished with 34 points, he was late to have an influence, the Celtics’ defense swarming and forcing him into turnovers that led to easy Boston baskets. The Lakers turned the ball over 14 times for 16 Celtics points.
James finished with 22 points, 14 rebounds and nine assists.
The loss ended the Lakers’ eight-game winning streak.
While any reaction to the end of that streak is basically an overreaction, the loss against Boston (46-18) did highlight some of the issues the Lakers are still trying to solve as they transition into a team driven mostly by Doncic.
In his second game back after injuring his calf, Austin Reaves’ vanished from the game plan, at least as a playmaker. He had only two assists after finishing with none in the Lakers’ win over the Knicks.
Reaves scored 16, but the Lakers, who were without Jaxson Hayes and Rui Hachimura because of minor knee injuries, couldn’t get another player into double figures.
“We can compete versus anyone in this league. So we’ll be fine,” James said. “We got to continue to build our habits. We’re not where they are, the defending champion. And they’ve been playing basketball together for a long time. And they got a great chemistry and know what they want to do. We made an acquisition late in the season, and we’re still trying to build. And we want to get full.
“That’s the number one objective for us, how we can get full and get all our guys together and see exactly what we look like. So we feel like we can compete versus anybody.”
The Lakers play the Nets on Monday night in Brooklyn.
“We’ve had many situations where a player deals with some type of injury or a trade or whatever it is, and we’ve done a really good job of bouncing back,” Reaves said. “And I don’t expect anything else. Like I said, it’s a next-man-up mentality. Not one person’s gonna do what LeBron does for us. But you can do it as a collective. And… hopefully he gets back out on the court soon.”
This story originally appeared on LA Times
