The biggest news Tuesday with the Lakers was about the health of LeBron James and the increased minutes for Luka Doncic.
James, who didn’t play in Sunday’s All-Star Game in San Francisco because of lingering ankle and foot discomfort, has been listed as questionable for the Lakers game against Charlotte on Wednesday night at Crypto.com Arena.
“It’s something that we managed all year and it was sore over the weekend,” Lakers coach JJ Redick said after practice Tuesday. “He was able to do most of practice today. But, like it’s been all year, like it’s a day-to-day thing. It’s just something that we’ve had to manage and we’ll continue to manage throughout the rest of the year.”
James, 40 and a 22-year veteran, is averaging 24.3 points per game, 9.0 assists and 7.7 rebounds over 34.5 minutes per game. He is shooting 51.6% from the field and 39.5% from three-point range. He has played in 48 of the Lakers’ 52 games before the All-Star break.
In the two games Doncic has played in with the Lakers since being acquired in a blockbuster deal from the Dallas Mavericks that was headlined by Anthony Davis, he has averaged 23.5 minutes per game.
Both games were against the Utah Jazz and both were blowouts as the teams split.
But with six days off over the All-Star break, Redick said Doncic will be fine for an increased load.
“His minutes will be up tomorrow,” Redick said. “I don’t think there is going to be any sort of restrictions going forward.”
Challenging schedule
The Lakers open play after the All-Star break against Charlotte on Wednesday night in a makeup game from a Jan. 9 postponement because of the wildfires in the Los Angeles area.
Then the Lakers play on Thursday night in Portland and at Denver on Saturday.
The Lakers will have two days off after the Nuggets game and then play eight games over 14 days, and just two of the opponents are below .500. They have another set of back-to-back games during that stretch.
“The next month is going to be a huge challenge for us,” Redick said. “It’s the quality of opponent, but it’s also just the schedule in general. It’s going to be difficult. We’ve got to fight through it as a group.”
The Lakers are 32-20 and currently the fifth seed in the competitive Western Conference.
They had won 12 of their last 15 games heading into the break.
Redick said they got prepared for the second half of the season with a good practice Tuesday.
“A lot of it was just getting up and down the court,” Redick said. “We did some execution stuff. Still trying to get the new guys acclimated to different things. But mostly just about guys getting up and down, reacclimating them to play at a high level.”
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