{"id":725476,"date":"2026-04-13T18:01:19","date_gmt":"2026-04-13T18:01:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/725476\/"},"modified":"2026-04-13T18:01:19","modified_gmt":"2026-04-13T18:01:19","slug":"how-do-lakers-match-up-against-houston-rockets-in-the-nba-playoffs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/725476\/","title":{"rendered":"How do Lakers match up against Houston Rockets in the NBA playoffs?"},"content":{"rendered":"

p]:text-cms-story-body-color-text clearfix”> <\/p>\n

The Lakers<\/a> got a taste of a playoff atmosphere against the Houston Rockets only a month ago. They can recreate the moment again, this time with real postseason stakes, but the No. 4 seed in the Western Conference will be missing a key component from those thrilling wins.<\/p>\n

Luka Doncic<\/a>, still getting specialized treatment in Europe for his Grade 2 left hamstring strain, is a long shot to return during the first round of the playoffs, which begin Saturday at 5:30 p.m. at Crypto.com Arena.<\/p>\n

Between Doncic and Austin Reaves<\/a>, who is out with a Grade 2 left oblique strain, the Lakers have lost their two leading scorers and an average of 56.8 points per game. They lost the No. 3 seed. But by finishing the season with three consecutive wins to maintain home-court advantage in the first round of the playoffs, they haven\u2019t lost their fight.<\/p>\n

They\u2019ll need it against the Rockets.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe playoffs, to me, are all about resiliency,\u201d Lakers coach JJ Redick<\/a> said. \u201c… You\u2019re playing one opponent in the playoffs and there\u2019s a bunch of things that are gonna happen, some good, some bad. You may get down in a series. You may get down in the game, you may get down in the game on the road. And just, you have to play with resiliency.\u201d<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s how the teams match up:<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"p]:text-cms-story-body-color-text clearfix”> The Lakers got a taste of a playoff atmosphere against the Houston Rockets only a month…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":725477,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5130],"tags":[300555,94566,1910,4345,3136,8604,3365,300554,300556,142214,449,300553,24566,40087,8595,358,73837,3187],"class_list":["post-725476","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-houston","tag-apg","tag-defensive-rating","tag-game","tag-houston","tag-houston-rockets","tag-lakers","tag-luka-doncic","tag-nba-playoff","tag-net-rating","tag-offensive-rating","tag-point","tag-ppg","tag-rebound","tag-rpg","tag-sengun","tag-texas","tag-turnover","tag-tx"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116398711631968252","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/725476","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=725476"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/725476\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/725477"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=725476"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=725476"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=725476"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}