Boston – LeBron James led against Jaylen Brown, turning and swivel and rushing until he makes a left -handed floating hook. The basket reduced the Los Angeles Lakers deficit, which was 20 points to start the fourth quarter, seven points, 92-85, with 7:05 am to play in the match.
After a third brutal quarter, in which they were upgraded 29-13, the Lakers made an animated charge. They had the momentum that was moving in their favor. At least it seemed.
While James met to return to defense, he started to move with care. During the next defensive possession, James, dealing with discomfort, moved on a brown road while the Boston Celtics star threw the undisputed ball. James immediately raised his hand, signaling the Lakers coach staff he wanted to get out of the game.
Lakers have called timeless time with 6:44 to play. While he was heading for the touch, James told coach JJ Redick: “It’s my groin.” At this point, Redick shared later, he mentally excluded James for the rest of the match and began to think about how the Lakers could win without their 40 -year -old superstar.
During the dead time, James tried to squat and stretch his groin with longtime coach Mike Mancas, but he grimacted in pain and finally destroyed in the locker room. James was quickly excluded with a tension from the left groin.
“I may have a little too wide,” said James afterwards.
The Lakers gathered to obtain less than four points twice, but the stellar of the Celtics of Jayson Tatum and Brown was too much to overcome. Boston broke the Victories of Eight Lakers’ Victories, Won 111-101 at TD Garden to drop Los Angeles to 40-22 and n ° 3 to the west.
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LeBron James des Lakers to miss 1 to 2 weeks with the stretched groin: Sources
The biggest subject after the game was the tension of the groin of James – and how long it could be released. James minimized the initial fears with his injury, and Sunday, the team’s sources confirmed that he had to miss 1 to 2 weeks.
James said his mind had immediately passed on Christmas day 2018 against the Golden State Warriors in Oakland, California, when he suffered a torn groin that made him miss the following 17 games in his first season with the Lakers.
But James clearly said that this injury is not as serious.
“No, it’s not as bad as it,” said James. “It’s not as bad as that.”
James then turned to his locker and hit the wood near his label to try not to Jinx himself.
“Obviously, to hurt themselves at that time, these injuries (groin) are – I don’t want to say the worst, but they are difficult to manage,” said Luka Dončić. “So take your time. And we must have a next height mentality as a team. »»
To make matters worse, Redick said Rui Hachimura will miss at least another week with a knee injury. Jaxson Hayes also remains with a bruise in the knee. Add James and the entire starting area of the Lakers is released.
It would be one of the worst parts of the regular season for James to be potentially missed, the Lakers playing the Denver Nuggets n ° 2 twice in the next 10 days. The Lakers finished their road trip in Brooklyn on Monday, then in Milwaukee on Thursday and Denver on Friday. This back to back starts an eight -day section in which they play three consecutive consecutive: in Milwaukee / Denver, against Phoenix / VS. San Antonio and against Denver / VS. Milwaukee.
While things arise, the Lakers are half a game in the Win column behind Nuggets n ° 2 (41-22), two games in the loss column on Memphis Grizzlies No. 4 (39-24), three in the Warriors loss column n ° 5 (36-28).
How can Lakers potentially survive James without James?
“I think we just have to continue playing hard and playing the defense,” said Redick.
Redick is not wrong. Lakers, the best defense of the league since January 15, will have to rely more on this end of speech to take off from matches and generate a transitional offense.
There is no replacement of James for one. He appeared in 58 of the 62 games of the Lakers and was their crossing during this 20-5 section which included portions without Anthony Davis or Dončić. James has just won the player of the month since February and is playing at a MVP level and at the level of the first All-NBA team. For the season, it has an average of 25.1 points out of 51.8% of shots (39.1% out of 3) to accompany 8.5 assists and 8.1 rebounds.
With Dončić on the ground and James out of the ground, the Lakers outclass the opponents of 21.6 points for 100 possessions, by cleaning the glass. In these alignments, the Lakers are on average 122.9 points for 100 possessions (92nd centile offensively) and only grant 101.4 points per 100 defensively (99th centile defensively). It is a small sample size – only 216 possessions – but it offers at least a little encouragement that Lakers can find a way to continue winning without James.
It should be noted that when the Hachimura’s deletion of these alignments – because at least several games will be missing – these alignments led by Dončić fall to more than 11.0 points by possessions (out of 146 possessions). Remove the Hayes and Alignments improve at more than 17.1 points per 100 possessions (117 possessions).
“We have had many situations where a player takes care of a certain type of injury or a profession or anything, and we have done a very good work of rebound,” said Austin Reaves. “And I don’t expect anything else. It is a next height mentality. Not a person will do what LeBron does for us. But you can do it as a collective. And … I hope he will soon come back to the field. »»
James will continue to travel with the team during his four -game trip, although he noted: “We will see what will happen in the coming days, then from there.
With or without James, the objective of the Lakers is clear: continue to win as many matches as possible and try to enter the playoffs as healthy as possible.
“We can compete against anyone in this league,” said James. “So everything will be fine. We must continue to build our habits. … We made an acquisition at the end of the season, and we always try to build. And we want to be full. This is the objective n ° 1 for us: how we can bring together and bring together all our guys and see exactly what we look like. »»
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(Photo: Elsa / Getty Images)
