LOS ANGELES -- Lakers star Luka Doncic suffered a left leg contusion in the first half of Saturday's 103-88 loss to the LA Clippers and did not return.
Doncic came into the night leading the NBA in scoring with a career-best 35.2 points per game to go with averages of 9.1 assists, 8.8 rebounds and 1.7 steals.
He struggled in the first half against the Clippers, scoring 12 points on 4-of-13 shooting (1-of-6 on 3-pointers) with 5 rebounds, 2 assists and 4 turnovers. The Lakers trailed 54-39 at the break.
"I saw him hobbling towards the end of the first half. He came to me at halftime and said he couldn't go," Lakers coach JJ Redick said after the game.
Doncic left the Intuit Dome without speaking to reporters, and Redick did not speculate about how long Doncic could be out.
"I don't have any other information," Redick said.
Doncic missed three games in late October with a lower left leg contusion; however Saturday's circumstances appear to be unrelated. A source familiar with the injury told ESPN it was caused by a collision with Clippers guard Bogdan Bogdanovic.
The Lakers were already missing three starters: Austin Reaves (left calf), Deandre Ayton (left elbow) and Rui Hachimura (right groin).
Dalton Knecht started the second half in Doncic's place.
"No matter what the circumstances are, it's still next man up," LeBron James said afterward. "We're all professionals. We all got to stay ready. So, obviously it's very challenging circumstances for our ball club tonight, but I think we played extremely hard, we followed our keys. We just came up short."
James scored a season-high 36 points on 15-for-28 shooting (3-for-7 on 3-pointers) and helped cut a 22-point third-quarter deficit to seven early in the fourth before the Lakers relented.
The rest of the team was 19-for-60 (31.7%), including 3-for-31 from 3 (9.7%).
"We just didn't hit shots tonight," Lakers forward Jake LaRavia said. "I mean, that's really what it was. We were 6-for-38 from 3 [as a team], we missed seven free throws. Tough to win basketball games like that. I thought we played really, really hard. But yeah, shots just were not falling."
Redick did not rule out the possibility of Reaves and Ayton being available for the Lakers' next game Tuesday on the road against the Phoenix Suns. He said he was "hopeful" that Hachimura's groin injury would keep him out for only 3-5 days.
The loss dropped the Lakers to 19-8, No. 4 in the Western Conference. They host the West's current No. 5 team, the Houston Rockets, on Christmas Day after the quick one-game trip to Phoenix.
"The worst thing about sports is injuries," James said. "And not just basketball, but sports in general. You control the controllables, but what we have out there, whoever is in uniform, we have to go out and execute at the utmost pace that we can and on the other end, we got to defend on a string and help each other out."