LOS ANGELES — The Lakers’ roster went from short-handed to depleted within a day.
Barely 24 hours removed from picking up a road win against the Sacramento Kings on Sunday night without five players, including stars Luka Doncic and LeBron James, the Lakers’ task somehow became more challenging on Monday night: match up against a stingy Portland Trail Blazers team without all but one of their main ball handlers.
With veteran guards Marcus Smart and Gabe Vincent added to the injury report, the Lakers were left with fifth-year guard Austin Reaves as the lone ball-handler signed to the main roster available on Monday.
And even though Reaves, who was fresh off scoring a career-high 51 points against the Kings, has shown multiple times he can lead the Lakers in these types of situations, the Blazers were too suffocating, handing the Lakers a 122-108 defeat at Crypto.com Arena.
Reaves led the way with 41 points on 13-of-22 shooting from the field (3 for 8 from 3-point range) for the third 40-point game of his NBA career to go with five assists and four rebounds. He went 12 for 14 at the free-throw line.
But Reaves also had eight of the Lakers’ 25 turnovers, with the Blazers scoring 28 points off the Lakers’ giveaways in addition to the 35 second-chance points Portland scored off of 19 offensive rebounds.
The Lakers (2-2) hung around for most of the first half, leading by as many as five in the opening quarter and having multiple leads in the second before trailing by six (57-51) at halftime.
But the visitors’ physicality and intensity picked up coming out of the mid-game break.
Deandre Ayton (16 points, eight rebounds) and Rui Hachimura (16 points, six assists) also scored in double figures for the Lakers. So did Jarred Vanderbilt, who finished with a season-high 14 points on 6-of-10 shooting to go with seven rebounds and three assists.
Second-year guard/forward Dalton Knecht scored 13 of the Lakers’ 15 bench points before both teams emptied their benches with the Blazers leading 119-105 with 1:14 remaining.
Knecht finished with 16 points on 5-of-13 shooting.
Portland was led by Deni Avdija’s 25 points, four assists, four rebounds and three blocked shots. Jrue Holiday finished with 24 points, six assists, five rebounds and two blocked shots.
Jerami Grant scored 22 points off the bench for the Blazers.
More to come on this story.