The Los Angeles Lakers released their injury report for Monday night’s game against the Washington Wizards and Luka Doncic (league suspension), Marcus Smart (right ankle contusion) and Adou Thiero (left knee soreness) are all out.
Doncic picked up his 16th technical foul of the season in Friday night’s win over the Brooklyn Nets and it was upheld by the league, so he will serve a mandatory one-game suspension that comes with that. While that is not ideal considering Doncic has been on an absolute tear as of late, the Lakers should be able to handle the tanking Wizards without him if they continue to play how they have over this recent stretch.
It’s also the first night of a back-to-back for L.A. with the Cleveland Cavaliers coming to town on Tuesday, so Doncic will be well-rested and fresh for that game.
Meanwhile, Smart will now be missing his fourth straight game and Thiero his third with their respective injuries. Lakers head coach JJ Redick has said he considers both to be day-to-day, so their statuses will be worth monitoring for the Cavaliers game on Tuesday.
With only eight games left to go in the regular season, the Lakers are hoping to get fully healthy and continue their second-half play to make some noise in the Western Conference playoffs. Smart has been essential to the Lakers’ success this season but has logged a ton of minutes and games, so it makes sense to be cautious with the veteran to get him back to 100% as the regular season winds down.
Luka Doncic explains double technical that led to suspension
Doncic had been on his best behavior in recent weeks with officials as he knew he was one technical foul away from receiving a suspension. He originally received his 16th in a recent win over the Orlando Magic on a double technical for back-and-forth trash talk with Goga Bitadze, but that wound up being rescinded by the NBA.
While Doncic has been doing a good job laying off officials, he again got a double technical in the Nets game and explained what led to it after the win.
“He was yelling in my face three times, I just wanted to get out of there. It’s a double tech, of course…What can I say? I didn’t even talk, I just wanted to get out of there,” Doncic said. “They said my push was exaggerated which it obviously was not. I don’t know what else to say.”
Doncic will receive another one-game suspension if he gets two more technicals once he returns, although at that point the Lakers will only have seven regular-season games remaining.
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