![\"Luka](\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/GettyImages-2268966069-e1775206836960.jpg\")
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Luka Doncic #77 of the Los Angeles Lakers reacts from the floor after a play during the second half against the Oklahoma City Thunder at the Paycom Center on April 2, 2026 in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. <\/p>\n
Slovenian guard Luka Doncic<\/a> is in danger of not qualifying for end-of-season awards and honors like All-NBA and MVP after enduring a hamstring injury in Thursday\u2019s 139-96 loss to the Oklahoma City Thunder<\/a>. That\u2019s because the Los Angeles Lakers<\/a> star suffered the injury in his 64th game of the season<\/a>, falling just one game short of the 65-game threshold needed to maintain eligibility for awards.<\/p>\n Per\u00a0ESPN\u2019s Dave McMenamin<\/a>, Doncic would have received a grace had he played in at least 85% of the Lakers\u2019 77 games before his injury. However, since he appeared in 83% of the games, he would have to play at least one more game to qualify for the awards.<\/p>\n Luka Doncic MVP Dreams Over?<\/p>\n \u201cDepending on how much time Doncic has to miss, Thursday might have cost him not only a shot at his first MVP but even his eligibility for the award at all,\u201d wrote McMenamin. \u201cThe game was his 64th of the season, and players must play 65 to qualify for end-of-season awards. The Lakers have five games remaining.<\/p>\n \u201cThere is an exception for players who reach 62 games and play at least 85% of their team\u2019s games at the time of a season-ending injury, but that would not apply to Doncic. He has played in 64 of the Lakers\u2019 77 games, which is 83%.\u201d<\/p>\n The ESPN report further noted that Doncic would have to meet the CBA\u2019s \u201cseason-ending injury\u201d exception to be eligible for the awards.<\/p>\n \u201cFurthermore, Doncic\u2019s hamstring injury would have to qualify as a \u201cseason-ending injury\u201d as the CBA defines it. That means it would need to be an injury that, in the opinion of a physician jointly selected by the NBA<\/a> and players\u2019 association, makes it substantially more likely than not that the player would be unable to play through May 31 following the date of his injury.<\/p>\n \u201cOtherwise, it would simply be an injury that happens to coincide with the end of the regular season, which is what appears to be the case with Doncic right now.\u201d<\/p>\n Luka Doncic Injury Update<\/p>\n Doncic would undergo an MRI on Friday to determine the severity of his hamstring injury. If it\u2019s a grade 2 strain, Doncic could be forced to miss multiple weeks of action, putting his status for the NBA playoffs in jeopardy.<\/p>\n The best-case scenario for Doncic would be a grade 1 strain, which could keep him out for approximately a week. It\u2019s worth noting that Doncic missed four games earlier this year due to a grade 1 hamstring injury. As such, there\u2019s still a possibility that Doncic could return and play in one of the Lakers\u2019 last five games to stay eligible for All-NBA.<\/p>\n Even if Doncic doesn\u2019t reach the 65-game threshold, he will win the NBA scoring title for the second time in his career, having played in at least 58 games<\/a> this season. Doncic has averaged 33.5 points, 8.3 assists, 7.7 rebounds and 1.6 steals from 64 games.<\/p>\n The Lakers (50-27) will next play the Dallas Mavericks<\/a> (24-52) in an away game Sunday before returning home to face the Thunder (61-16) in a rematch of Thursday\u2019s contest.<\/p>\n \n\t\t\tSai Mohan<\/a> covers the NBA for Heavy.com. Based in Portugal, Sai is a seasoned sports writer with nearly two decades of publishing experience, including bylines at Yardbarker, FanSided’s Hoops Habit, International Business Times, Hindustan Times and more. More about Sai Mohan<\/a>\t\t<\/p>\n \n\t\t\tMore Heavy on Lakers\n\t\t<\/p>\n \n\t\t\t\tLoading more stories\n\t\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Getty Luka Doncic #77 of the Los Angeles Lakers reacts from the floor after a play during the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":695657,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3790],"tags":[7,4034,1698,300,4044,251,150,4033,4043,6],"class_list":{"0":"post-695656","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-los-angeles-lakers","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-la","10":"tag-la-lakers","11":"tag-lakers","12":"tag-lalakers","13":"tag-los-angeles","14":"tag-los-angeles-lakers","15":"tag-losangeles","16":"tag-losangeleslakers","17":"tag-nba"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116340195987447980","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/695656","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=695656"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/695656\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/695657"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=695656"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=695656"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=695656"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}