{"id":568064,"date":"2026-01-29T07:36:21","date_gmt":"2026-01-29T07:36:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/568064\/"},"modified":"2026-01-29T07:36:21","modified_gmt":"2026-01-29T07:36:21","slug":"cavaliers-court-raises-safety-concerns-again-as-luka-doncic-injures-leg-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/568064\/","title":{"rendered":"Cavaliers court raises safety concerns again as Luka Doncic injures leg"},"content":{"rendered":"

Luka Doncic grabbed at his left leg. He immediately thought of Dru Smith<\/a>. The Miami Heat guard\u2019s knee injury suffered in 2023 when he slipped off the side of the Cleveland Cavaliers court haunted Doncic while he winced in pain near the Lakers<\/a> bench.<\/p>\n

The Lakers superstar avoided serious injury after falling off the side of the Cavaliers\u2019 raised court on Monday, but the threat of a player being hurt by Cleveland\u2019s unique 10-inch drop off between the court and the arena floor came into focus again during the Lakers\u2019 129-99 loss to the Cavaliers<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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\u201cIt is absolutely a safety hazard,\u201d Lakers coach JJ Redick said after Doncic was able to return later in the first quarter. \u201cAnd I don’t know why it’s still like that. I don’t. You know, you can lodge formal complaints. A lot of times you don’t see any change when you lodge a formal complaint.\u201d<\/p>\n

Doncic was injured shooting a fadeaway<\/a> three with 7:58 left in the first quarter. He was hopping on one foot after releasing the shot and hopped right off the platform, grabbing immediately for his left leg. When he hobbled to the locker room, Doncic could barely put any weight on his leg.<\/p>\n

Read more: ‘Like it was yesterday.’ Lakers lose in emotional return to Cleveland for LeBron James<\/a><\/p>\n

But he returned with 1:32 remaining in the first quarter and finished with 29 points, six assists and five rebounds. He didn\u2019t have any additional braces or wraps on his left leg, but he said he didn\u2019t feel quite 100%.<\/p>\n

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\u201cI kind of got scared,\u201d Doncic said. \u201cIt wasn’t a great feeling and looking back at the video I think I got a little bit lucky. It hurts obviously more now, but, just, I tried to go.”<\/p>\n

Smith was injured much more severely in 2023 when he was closing out on defense, landed on a stat sheet and slipped over the edge. He suffered a season-ending anterior cruciate ligament sprain in the accident, and the Heat contacted the NBA to express concerns about the floor at the time.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s tough to see another player get hurt on this court, with the fall, with the drop off,\u201d Lakers guard Gabe Vincent said Monday, \u201cso hopefully something can get fixed with that, but we\u2019re fortunate that [Doncic] is OK.\u201d<\/p>\n

Cleveland\u2019s Rocket Arena, which opened in 1994 and was last renovated in 2019, is also home to the Cleveland Monsters, an American Hockey League affiliate of the Columbus Blue Jackets. The basketball court is raised to accommodate the ice underneath the floor. But several teams in the NBA, including the Lakers, share their arena with hockey teams and none have a court that drops off like Cleveland\u2019s.<\/p>\n

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\u201cIt’s the only court like this so, I guess it’s my fault,\u201d Doncic said. \u201cI [gotta] stop jumping like that.”<\/p>\n

Read more: ‘Just be a good basketball player.’ How Rui Hachimura is thriving off the bench<\/a><\/p>\n

The Lakers have history with concerning courts this year. In November, Doncic said during a postgame news conference that the Lakers\u2019 custom NBA Cup court used during a home game against the Clippers was dangerously slippery. The team flagged the problem to the league and the Lakers did not use the court again because it was not deemed safe for play in time for the other NBA Cup games.<\/p>\n

But when asked if there was a way he could bring the latest problem up with the league, Doncic demurred.<\/p>\n

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\u201cI don\u2019t know,\u201d Doncic said, \u201cdon\u2019t involve me in that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Similarly, Redick said any changes would be “way above my pay grade.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sign up for our weekly newsletter on all things Lakers.<\/a><\/p>\n

This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Luka Doncic grabbed at his left leg. He immediately thought of Dru Smith. The Miami Heat guard\u2019s knee…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":568065,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[3772],"tags":[7,306,305,193,3846,559,26054,9481,370,1661,300,368,189,75489,6],"class_list":{"0":"post-568064","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-cleveland-cavaliers","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-cavaliers","10":"tag-cleveland","11":"tag-cleveland-cavaliers","12":"tag-clevelandcavaliers","13":"tag-clippers","14":"tag-columbus-blue-jackets","15":"tag-dru-smith","16":"tag-gabe-vincent","17":"tag-jj-redick","18":"tag-lakers","19":"tag-luka-doncic","20":"tag-miami-heat","21":"tag-nae39qwan-tomlin","22":"tag-nba"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/115977242792801920","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/568064","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=568064"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/568064\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/568065"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=568064"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=568064"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=568064"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}