LeBron James sat back in the far chair on the Lakers’ bench, dressed in all black with sunglasses to match when a tight grin crossed his face.
The crowd was suddenly at its most alive, chanting “MVP, MVP.”
It wasn’t for James — the NBA’s all-time leading scorer — who was sidelined and forced to watch with his hands folded and legs crossed. It wasn’t for Anthony Davis, still out of rhythm after a tough loss days earlier.
No, the most valuable player, at least Sunday, was Austin Reaves.
“That was him being his normal self,” coach Darwin Ham said. “… He was great.”
Then it happened again, again and again and again — one roar after Reaves’ free throw rolled around the rim and in and another as he iced the game from the line.
He scored 35 points, a career high for the second-year player the Lakers signed as an undrafted free agent, in leading the Lakers to a 111-105 win against the Orlando Magic at Crypto.com Arena.
The win stopped the Lakers’ first losing streak since newcomers D’Angelo Russell, Malik Beasley and Jarred Vanderbilt have been available to play.
Sunday marked three weeks since James suffered a foot injury in Dallas, an injury that threatened to unravel the Lakers season.
It hasn’t — the team had split the 10 games prior to Sunday with James recovering.
In the most optimistic on-the-record assessment to date, Ham spoke of “when” James would return, the absence of an “if” being notable.
“Yeah, we anticipate him coming back at some point,” Ham said when asked about his word choice.
Without James, the .500 ball the Lakers have played has been good enough to keep them in the postseason race. It hasn’t, though, been good enough for them to gain any meaningful ground.
“We just have to continuously defend our tails off, make sure we’re getting good contests on shots, try to come up with rebounds, holding teams to one possession. And then staying disciplined with our pace, our running habits and sharing the ball. And we can live with the results,” Ham said before the game.
“Bron, with him being out, it’s revealed that we have a lot of different weapons that are very capable players on both sides of the ball that can help us achieve the goal we’re trying to achieve.
“And when he comes back, he’s just going to add to it. But guys just got to play. We’ve got to stay together.”
James’ return would be a massive boost to Davis, who had to carry the primary offensive load.
After a disastrous stretch to close Friday’s loss to the Dallas Mavericks when he fouled a three-point shooter, missed a key free throw and had the game-winner swished over his hand, Davis wasn’t able to get fully back on track against the Magic.
He split on each of his first three trips to the free-throw line, the crowd murmured as the shots rimmed out. Despite Davis shooting better than 80% from the line this season, clutch misses in losses have moved from coincidence to trend.
Davis scored 15 on 15 shots Sunday, the Lakers benefited from one major fact — Davis’ bad nights are never that bad because of his influence on defense. Sunday, he had four blocks and two steals in the win.
The Lakers survived a rough start to the game thanks to early shooting from Troy Brown Jr. From there, as Orlando fought back one day after the Magic beat the Clippers in the same building, players all over the roster had key moments.
Russell scored 18 and Dennis Schroder added 12, with Rui Hachimura and Wenyen Gabriel each adding to the win with hustle and timely plays.
But in the fourth, Reaves took over, working his way to the line and hitting the game’s biggest shots. He scored 13 in the final quarter, the crowd serenading him at each stoppage.
“Happy he’s on our team and we damn sure needed him tonight,” Ham said.
This story originally appeared in the Los Angeles Times.