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HOUSTON, TEXAS – MARCH 18: Austin Reaves #15 of the Los Angeles Lakers celebrates with Luka Doncic #77 of the Los Angeles Lakers during the second half against the Houston Rockets at Toyota Center on March 18, 2026 in Houston, Texas. <\/p>\n
The Los Angeles Lakers<\/a> will be without two stars, Luka Doncic<\/a> and Austin Reaves,<\/a> for their upcoming game against the Dallas Mavericks<\/a> on Sunday, April 5. Both are listed on the Lakers\u2019 injury report<\/a> and are not expected to return anytime soon, let alone the game against the Mavericks.<\/p>\n Doncic suffered a grade two hamstring strain<\/a> with no exact return timeline, while Reaves suffered an oblique strain<\/a>, expected to miss at least four to six weeks.<\/p>\n Despite that, the Lakers have a game to play against Dallas, and regardless of those brutal injuries, the team announced its final injury report for Sunday, one that surprisingly does, in fact, feature some good news for the team.<\/p>\n Los Angeles Lakers Final Injury Report, Jarred Vanderbilt Injury Update LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA \u2013 MARCH 12: Jarred Vanderbilt #2 of the Los Angeles Lakers looks to pass during the first half of a game against the Chicago Bulls<\/a> at Crypto.com Arena on March 12, 2026 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Sean M. Haffey\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n As mentioned, both Doncic and Reaves are listed on the Lakers\u2019 injury report, not expected to return anytime soon, each with an uncertain status for the playoffs.<\/p>\n Along with the starting backcourt out, the Lakers will also be without Marcus Smart<\/a>, as he is sidelined once again with a right ankle injury.<\/p>\n Smart has missed the last seven games for Los Angeles. It was previously a hip injury that head coach JJ Redick didn\u2019t think would be a big issue<\/a>, but it\u2019s now an ankle that has kept him out for a prolonged period.<\/p>\n However, a few days ago, Redick did give the indication<\/a> that he thought Smart would be able to suit up Sunday for the game against the Mavericks.<\/p>\n Lakers coach JJ Redick says Marcus Smart, who will miss his sixth straight game tonight, participated in an on-court workout today and could play as soon as Sunday against the Dallas Mavericks<\/p>\n \u201cLakers coach JJ Redick says Marcus Smart, who will miss his sixth straight game tonight, participated in an on-court workout today and could play as soon as Sunday against the\u00a0Dallas Mavericks<\/a>,\u201d\u00a0Dave McMenamin wrote on X.<\/a><\/p>\n Based on the latest Lakers injury report, that is not the case.<\/p>\n Despite Smart still out, the Lakers did announce that Jarred Vanderbilt<\/a> has been upgraded to available and will play in the game against Dallas. He was previously questionable<\/a> with a calf soreness, but will now play<\/a>, likely in a bigger role than before with Doncic and Reaves out.<\/p>\n Jarred Vanderbilt (right calf) is available today against Dallas, per the Lakers<\/p>\n In summary, Doncic, Reaves, and Smart make up the Lakers\u2019 injury report against the Mavericks.<\/p>\n Lakers Without Luka Doncic And Austin Reaves<\/p>\n Los Angeles will have to get used to playing without Doncic and Reaves for the time being, as each could very well miss at least a month, and have a major risk of re-aggravating<\/a> their current injuries whenever they do come back.<\/p>\n However, the 2026 NBA Playoffs <\/a>are less than two weeks away, and with that, the Lakers need to find a way to keep their recent winning ways despite not having their top-two scorers, who account for nearly 60 points per game on average.<\/p>\n Previously, and while he said it before Reaves\u2019 season-ending injury was announced, Redick believes the team needs to continue to focus on the goal ahead.<\/p>\n \u201cI don\u2019t have the luxury of overreacting. I don\u2019t have the luxury of overreacting to an OKC blowout. I don\u2019t have the luxury of overreacting to Luka getting hurt. My job has to be focusing on who\u2019s available and and getting those guys in a position to be successful\u201d \u2013 JJ Redick <\/p>\n \u201cOur mission, it hasn\u2019t changed,\u201d Redick said,<\/a> per McMenamin. \u201cThe rest of these guys and my staff, we\u2019re going after the 3-seed and we\u2019re going to try to win a playoff series. And we\u2019ll see what happens with Luka.\u201d<\/p>\n With Doncic and Reaves both out, LeBron James<\/a> will take on a bigger role for the Lakers. He was previously playing as the team\u2019s third option on offense, but the oldest player in the NBA<\/a> will not become the lead man for Los Angeles.<\/p>\n \u201cI mean, it\u2019s a challenge for us,\u201d James said. \u201cIt\u2019s always got to be a next-man-up [mentality]. But there\u2019s no way you can replace that type of impact. So it\u2019s going to be a collective group. We all have to figure out a way to do a little bit more. \u2026 But now you got to be even more tightened up on the things that we do.\u201d<\/p>\n The Lakers are 50-27 and third in the Western Conference standings<\/a>, but face steep competition from the Denver Nuggets<\/a> and Houston Rockets<\/a> for that spot. Regardless of what happens with Doncic and Reaves, despite their uncertain return dates and timelines<\/a>, grabbing home-court advantage will be key for Los Angeles in the final five games of the regular season.<\/p>\n \n\t\t\tEli Gregorski<\/a> is a sports journalist covering the NBA for Heavy Sports. He has years of sports writing experience covering the NBA, NFL, college football and basketball, international soccer, and Formula One. He graduated from the University of Colorado Boulder, where he was the assistant sports editor for the award-winning CU Independent student publication. More about Eli Gregorski<\/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 HOUSTON, TEXAS – MARCH 18: Austin Reaves #15 of the Los Angeles Lakers celebrates with Luka Doncic…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":700165,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[3793],"tags":[7,686,149,4057,166,6],"class_list":{"0":"post-700164","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-dallas-mavericks","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-dallas","10":"tag-dallas-mavericks","11":"tag-dallasmavericks","12":"tag-mavericks","13":"tag-nba"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116353985189498469","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/700164","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=700164"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/700164\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/700165"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=700164"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=700164"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=700164"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Los](\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/GettyImages-2266734918_0ff3fc.jpg\")
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