Nov 11, 2026; Milwaukee, Wisconsin, USA; Los Angeles Lakers guard Austin Reaves (15) drives for the basket against Milwaukee Bucks center Jericho Sims (00) in the third quarter at Fiserv Forum. Mandatory Credit: Benny Sieu-Imagn Images\n<\/p>\n
The Los Angeles Lakers\u2019<\/a> star Austin Reaves<\/a> injured his left heel in the third quarter last night<\/a> against the Milwaukee Bucks<\/a> while attempting a dunk on a fast break.<\/p>\n While we await imaging results for a concrete timeline, Dr. Brian Sutterer, a renowned sports physician, offered a differential diagnosis for Reaves and summarized potential return timelines based on the injury\u2019s severity.<\/p>\n The best-case scenario here for the Lakers is that Reaves has a heel bruise, which would keep him out at least four games (1.3 weeks), if not more. Then, he could be looking at an \u2018all plantar fascia\u2019 injury, which would keep him out for at least nine games (2.7 weeks).<\/p>\n The worst-case scenario for the Lakers would be a torn plantar fascia, which would keep Austin Reaves out for at least 10 games (2.9 weeks).<\/p>\n \u201cPlantar fascia strain\/tear would be top of my list for Austin Reaves,\u201d Dr. Sutterer wrote<\/a> in the caption as he posted a report on the likely injuries Reaves could be facing.<\/p>\n Having Austin Reaves out for that many games would certainly be a morale killer for the Lakers. He has been a reliable second option so far, averaging 24.7 points, 4.7 assists, and 3.3 rebounds while shooting 51.3% from the field and 40.9% from beyond the arc.<\/p>\n However, their Slovenian superstar Luka Doncic<\/a> remained confident that the roster is deep enough for Reaves to take his time and return when he\u2019s fully healthy again.<\/p>\n \u201cI think we just got to have next-man-up mentality. Obviously, we lose a very, very good player. Hopefully it\u2019s not \u2013 it\u2019s nothing. We got to have next-man-up mentality,\u201d Doncic said<\/a> after the win over the Bucks last night.<\/p>\n Even though Doncic also injured himself in the fourth quarter, he said he should be fine for their next game.<\/p>\n The Lakers are now set to face the Suns<\/a> on Sunday, November 15.\u00a0Ahead of that fixture, ESPN\u2019s Shams Charania gave the latest intel on the Lakers stars\u2019 availability status against the Suns.<\/p>\n \u201cGood news for Luka Doncic. One source told me today that Luka Doncic actually woke up with no pain. He\u2019s feeling good, I\u2019m told, and he\u2019s going to go through his normal treatment process in the lead-up to Sunday\u2019s game in Phoenix\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cAs far as Austin Reaves is concerned, the expectation is that he\u2019s gonna undergo tests for his heel injury at some point today. The Lakers landed back in Los Angeles from Milwaukee late last night, so I\u2019m sure Austin Reaves slept a little. At some point, we\u2019re going to get a re-examination done of his injury,\u201d Charania concluded<\/a> in his recent appearance on NBA Today.<\/p>\n The Lakers will hope Reaves\u2019 injury is nothing serious, given his importance to their offensive success this season. While Doncic appears likely to be available against the Suns, losing Reaves for an extended stretch would certainly be a challenge and a test of the Lakers\u2019 depth.<\/p>\n All eyes now turn to the imaging results. And we hope Reaves sees only the best-case scenario in this injury situation.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Nov 11, 2026; Milwaukee, Wisconsin, USA; Los Angeles Lakers guard Austin Reaves (15) drives for the basket against…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":883300,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3775],"tags":[1013,7,103,102,121,3871,6],"class_list":["post-883299","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-milwaukee-bucks","tag-austin-reaves","tag-basketball","tag-bucks","tag-milwaukee","tag-milwaukee-bucks","tag-milwaukeebucks","tag-nba"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/117608967236956091","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/883299","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=883299"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/883299\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/883300"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=883299"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=883299"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=883299"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}