The Lakers played the same five-man lineup the entire second half of Game 4, a decision head coach JJ Redick said was not planned.
When the Lakers completed the trade for Luka Dončić — and also failed to make a deal for Mark Williams — it more-or-less married them to a flawed roster the rest of the season. The argument was simple: the future is brighter with Luka, but the present was far murkier.
Strong play from the Lakers in the second half of the regular season might have covered some flaws, but the playoffs have exposed them greatly. The Lakers’ bench has offered little in terms of actual production this series.
So, in Sunday’s Game 4 against the Wolves, head coach JJ Redick made the very bold decision not to make a sub in the second half.
After swapping out Dorian Finney-Smith for Jaxson Hayes in the starting lineup, the lineup of LeBron James, Luka Dončić, Austin Reaves, Rui Hachimura and DFS played the rest of the way.
It’s a move that literally hasn’t been done before as Redick made history. But with the Lakers facing a must-win situation, an extra day of rest between Games 4 and 5 and a bench still lacking in production in the first half, Redick rolled the dice in a big way.
“No, it wasn’t planned,” Redick said postgame. “We just made the decision at halftime.”
The Lakers had their best quarter of the series in the third period with the lineup and led seven with five minutes remaining. But whether it was a mixture of his team running out of gas or the Wolves executing at a high level, the Lakers faltered down the stretch again, losing by three to fall behind 3-1 in the series.
“It’s not a planned thing to play five guys an entire second half,” Redick reiterated. “We asked them at the beginning of the fourth quarter, we told them we had two extra two timeouts, if you need a sub, let us know. Those guys gave a lot.”
Asked if he was second-guessing the decision in hindsight, Redick pushed back and said he wasn’t.
“Once you kind of made that decision and they’re all in, you just have to trust them,” Redick said.
It was a huge call to make, especially in the moment. The easy argument is to point out no one has ever played a five-man lineup 24 consecutive minutes in a half for a reason. And it’s fair one.
When the Lakers were missing shots in the fourth and the offense slowed down to a crawl, it’s also easy to assume the players were fatigued. None of the five on the floor blamed fatigue for the lack of points in the fourth.
“We had some really good looks,” LeBron said. “Luka missed a point-blank layup to put us up seven. I missed a point-blank layup to put us up four. We had a couple opportunities. I don’t think fatigue had anything to do with that. We just missed some point blank shots. We were getting into what we wanted to get into. We just weren’t able to convert.”
“This is the playoffs,” Luka added. “Fatigue shouldn’t play any role in this. Played a lot of minutes, but that shouldn’t play a role. I think we just executed bad on the offensive end during the last minutes.”
The players likely aren’t going to come out after the game and say they were too tired to make shots in the fourth. But they also were pretty adamant that they were fine and it was a lack of execution, not fatigue.
“I was fine,” Rui said. “I was ready to play the whole game. But, of course, we kind of lost our rhythm and swag the last five minutes. It was a tough one. We found a rhythm with the five guys on the court literally the whole second half. So, we just kept it.
“It’s tough. The coaches had to make a decision. We all felt good, too. We had a lot timeouts. But, yeah, it was a tough one.”
Pointing to a lack of execution down the stretch alone isn’t clear-cut evidence of the team being tired. They were well-rested for Game 3 and gave up a 13-1 run to close the game as their offense grinded to a halt.
But, ultimately, it’s a results-based business Redick is in. He made a huge decision that didn’t go his way. As a rookie head coach, it’ll likely be something he remembers for quite some time and it feels safe to say there won’t be a second instance of this happening under Redick.
You can follow Jacob on Twitter at @JacobRude or on Bluesky at @jacobrude.bsky.social.