Domantas Sabonis injury: Pacers star suffers 'significant' ankle sprain vs. Lakers

Thu, Jan 20, 2022
NBA News (AP)

Domantas Sabonis landed on Russell Westbrook's foot as he came down with an offensive rebound and sprained his ankle with 4:54 remaining in the game between the Indiana Pacers and Los Angeles Lakers on Wednesday. After that, several things happened:

Sabonis hit a timely 3-pointer on a pick-and-pop with Caris LeVert, giving the Pacers an eight-point lead with about two-and-a-half minutes to go.
The Pacers beat the Lakers, 111-104, and Sabonis finished with 20 points, 12 rebounds and 10-assists, his third triple-double in two weeks.
Indiana coach Rick Carlisle said that the ankle sprain is "probably going to be significant."

From Indiana's perspective, the last one is not great. How not-great it is depends on how you interpret the word "significant." (I suppose it also depends how you read into Carlisle's use of the word "probably." Hey, maybe it won't turn out to be significant.)

Here is Sabonis spraining his ankle:

Here is Sabonis making the 3:

"He was not going to come out of this game," Carlisle said. "He was determined to help will us to the win, along with Caris and the other guys who were out there."

Carlisle went on to say that Sabonis "showed courage" by playing down the stretch. He described Sabonis' late 3-pointer as "one of the big shots of the year." Now the team must hope that this valiant effort did not make the injury any worse.

The win in Los Angeles snapped a four-game losing streak, and the Pacers also had a six-game losing streak after Christmas. Malcolm Brogdon returned from an Achilles injury against the Lakers, and Myles Turner remainsout with a foot injury. Indiana is 16-29 on the season, 13th in the East, 6.5 games out of the play-in and could move just about anybody (except Brogdon, who is ineligible to be traded) in between now and the Feb. 10 trade deadline.

The Pacers will visit the Golden State Warriors on Thursday.