LOS ANGELES — JJ Redick said last week in Dallas that he doesn’t have the luxury of overreacting.
The Lakers’ head coach shared that sentiment after Luka Doncic suffered the Grade 2 left hamstring strain that ended his regular season, and before Austin Reaves joined the Slovenian star on the sidelines with a Grade 2 left oblique muscle injury.
Redick has stuck to that messaging over the last three days, despite the emotional whiplash of the last 96 hours, a season irreversibly reset heading into the first round of the NBA playoffs in 10 days. The Lakers, currently occupying the No. 4 seed, have lost twice without Doncic and Reaves, the most recent of which was Tuesday night’s G League-showcase of sorts against the defending champion Oklahoma City Thunder, predictably falling, 123-87, in their lowest-scoring outing of the season.
If there was a silver lining, LeBron James didn’t play, and so the 41-year-old star avoided adding a third injury to the pile. How has Redick stayed focused on the task at hand with minimal star power available, keeping the Lakers focused on the big picture – identifying nine players for Redick’s playoff rotation – before an increasingly likely matchup against the currently fifth-seeded Houston Rockets?
“Task,” Redick said Tuesday night. “Just focused on the task, so my preparation doesn’t change. My messaging changes throughout the season, but it’s trying to get the team to the right point to go compete and play a basketball game and make the adjustments that we need to make, and find the guys that are able to do it that night.”
Redick has said the run up to the playoffs, which will begin April 18 or 19 for the Lakers, is a great opportunity to figure out who will fill out the team’s minutes beyond James, Marcus Smart and Deandre Ayton come the playoffs.
On Tuesday, however, some of those likely shoo-ins for the Lakers’ nine-man playoff rotation earned less-than-positive comments from their coach after the loss.
Forward Rui Hachimura earned an early hook due to a blown defensive assignment. Redick said Hachimura didn’t do his job so he removed him. Forward Jarred Vanderbilt played just five minutes after spatting with Redick during a second-quarter huddle when the coach pulled the 27-year-old role player due to a “confluence of things.” Ayton had just three points and three rebounds in 23 minutes, days after his coach said Ayton was going to receive touches he hasn’t had during the 2025-26 season.
Redick said Tuesday that his 7-footer has had plenty of plays called for him, but that he’s struggling to hold onto the basketball.
“He’s just had trouble catching the ball,” Redick said. “And I don’t know if that’s the passing or if it’s, you know, him trying to get position, he just, he hasn’t been able to catch the ball.”
This is the reality of the present-day Lakers. Luke Kennard, who has transitioned from primarily a 3-point threat off the bench into the team’s primary ballhandler since the injuries to Doncic and Reaves, said after Tuesday’s loss that the team has shifted from “riding on a high” to a day-by-day approach.
“Chemistry was high,” Kennard said. “We were really close as a group, and it still is. I feel like this might have brought us even closer. Obviously, it’s a different look out there on the court and different voices, but it was definitely a shock and something we weren’t expecting this late in the year going into the playoffs.”
Kennard said when players such as Doncic – who is in Europe attempting to expedite his recovery – and Reaves are unavailable, it naturally persuades those who are available to build and nurture connections on the team.
With three games remaining, those connections could pay dividends on the court as Redick crafts his postseason rotation.
“I know we want to win, we want to do what it takes to win,” Kennard said. “We have competitors in this locker room. When you have guys that’ll do that and play hard every night, anything can happen.”