Austin Reaves says ankle felt good after Warriors game

Any concerns Lakers fans had about Austin Reaves’ ankle were put to rest after the guard's solid performance against the Warriors.

Austin Reaves was limited in Lakers practice on the days before their preseason matchup against the Golden State Warriors due to a sore ankle.

He was listed as day-to-day but was cleared to play and on a minutes restriction for this contest.

Reaves played for 17 minutes, scored 13 points, grabbed three rebounds and dished out two assists.

Postgame Reaves mentioned how his ankle was holding up and luckily, all the information was good.

“Yeah, I feel good,” Reaves said. “I just like getting out there and playing. When they told me 15 to 18 minutes, obviously, like cool. When I got out there, I was like, ‘Oh, I wanna play more,’ but you stick to what the script is and trust the medical staff to put me in the best position to be healthy for the whole year. So, I felt good.

“I feel good now. I feel like I could have played more. But like I said, you stick to the script. Those guys are professionals and we had a plan going into the game and executed the plan and it felt really good.”

Reaves says he felt good, but what about the eye test? On Tuesday, Reaves looked like his regular self. He was effective offensively and defensively and his ankle didn’t look like it had hampered him.

He had the challenging task of chasing Steph Curry around most of his time on the court and he did about as well as anyone does keeping up with him.

Reaves has been an ironman for the Lakers throughout the years. Last season, Reaves played all 82 games and he hasn’t missed a regular season or playoff contest since Feb. 7, 2023; that’s 132 consecutive games played.

So, his missing a preseason game was a surprise, but a sore ankle isn’t a huge concern. Given how much he played on Tuesday and how he felt afterward, it seems he’ll be ready to go for the regular season, which starts on Oct. 22 against the Minnesota Timberwolves.

However, we still have two preseason games to go before the results count. The Lakers have had no games in Los Angeles this preseason and will end with back-to-backs on the road in Phoenix and Golden State.

Head coach JJ Redick has yet to announce who will and won’t play in each game, but don’t expect the complete roster to participate in both contests.

The good news is that, given how well his ankle has responded, if Reaves misses one of these games, it will be more about setting up the first game of the season than a cause for concern.

So far, the Lakers haven’t had any new significant injuries to their roster. Only Jarred Vanderbilt and Christian Wood are currently inactive and recovering from injuries.

The goal at this point is to enter the regular season as healthy as they were at the start of training camp and it looks like the Lakers are primed to do so.

You can follow Edwin on Twitter at @ECreates88.