The Los Angeles Lakers are in the midst of the most pivotal part of the 2023-24 season as they try to make a run up the Western Conference standings.
The Lakers are almost guaranteed to appear in the Play-In Tournament given their 36-31 record, but can at least put themselves in a position where they only need to win one game to secure a spot in the postseason. However, bad losses to the Sacramento Kings will make that climb up a lot tougher.
Injuries have been a problem for the team all years as several rotation players have been out at any given time. The most unfortunate injury has been Gabe Vincent, though, as the guard has only appeared in five games for Los Angeles.
Vincent has been rehabbing his knee injury that he underwent a procedure on and while he is making progress, his return is contingent upon his conditioning, via Dave McMenamin of ESPN:
Vincent did not participate in the live portion of practice today. Darvin Ham says Vincent is “status quo.” The final step in Vincent’s return process will be getting his conditioning back, a source told ESPN. https://t.co/gIIuYIoJSa
— Dave McMenamin (@mcten) March 15, 2024
Head coach Darvin Ham did not have much of an update on Vincent and other injured players at practice on Friday.
“No, there will be one coming soon though,” Ham said. “Gabe, Vando and C-Wood, they’re pretty much status quo. Cam got on the court today and did some stuff today so we’ll see how he feels tomorrow. He likely won’t be in the lineup but he’s making extreme progress and we feel good about that as well.”
Vincent was recently cleared for non-contact work, so it can be safely assumed he hasn’t suffered any setbacks in his rehab. Reconditioning is generally every player’s last step before they can resume play, so Vincent should be in line for some scrimmages the next couple of practices.
However, it’s hard to see where Vincent fits in as Ham has settled on a guard rotation that primarily features Austin Reaves, D’Angelo Russell and Spencer Dinwiddie. Dinwiddie was an insurance signing in the event that Vincent couldn’t return this season, but with him set to come back Ham will need to figure out how to divvy minutes.
Davin Ham says Lakers can’t skip details after loss to Kings
Ham wasn’t happy with how the Lakers looked in their loss to the Kings. Los Angeles get plenty of opportunities to close the gap and potentially steal a win, but Ham said the entire roster can’t skip details on the floor.
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