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Lakers Notes: Play-In Race, Davis, Vogel, LeBron

April 2nd 2022 at 11:01pm CST by Arthur Hill

The Lakers still have a chance to reach the play-in tournament, but there was an air of defeat surrounding the team following Friday’s loss to the Pelicans, writes Kyle Goon of The Orange County Register. After falling in what LeBron James called “pretty much was a must-win for us,” L.A. trails New Orleans by three games and San Antonio by one game with five left to play and the Spurs holding the tiebreaker.

The Lakers may need to go 5-0 to qualify, which would be a tall order for a team that hasn’t won more than four straight games all season and hasn’t posted consecutive wins since early January. The stretch starts with a home game against the Nuggets on Sunday afternoon, followed by the Suns, Warriors, Thunder and Nuggets again to close out the season.

“I mean, I hate losing,” James said Friday. “This is not what none of us signed up for obviously. But it’s not the worst thing that has happened to me so far.”

There’s more on the Lakers:

  • Friday marked Anthony Davis‘ return after missing six weeks with a sprained right foot, but he admits the injury wasn’t fully healed, Goon states in the same piece. Davis played nearly 37 minutes, but scored only four points in the fourth quarter and missed two important shots down the stretch. “The urgency was always there to try and get back; the foot was just not participating,” he said. “And then after the road trip, it was just, ‘All right, let’s do it. Just go and see what happens.’ I’m not all the way where I want it to be and maybe that’s where the discomfort was in the fourth quarter.”
  • Missing the play-in tournament would probably seal the fate of coach Frank Vogel, who is already rumored to be on the way out, Goon adds. Vogel used his 38th starting lineup of the season Friday, benching Austin Reaves and Talen Horton-Tucker and relying more on veterans such as Avery Bradley. “Put this one behind us, we competed, we fell short,” Vogel told reporters. “We have to beat Denver, start the recovery now.”
  • At 30.3 PPG, James has a narrow lead in the scoring race over Giannis Antetokounmpo and Joel Embiid, but he still must play in two more games to be eligible for the title, tweets Marc Stein. James missed two games this week with a sprained left ankle and is listed as questionable for Sunday, according to Brad Turner of The Los Angeles Times (Twitter link).
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