Deandre Ayton opens up on injury scare: ‘It felt like my knee broke’

Los Angeles Lakers starting center Deandre Ayton went down with an injury scare early on in their 108-106 win over the Utah Jazz last weekend. He suffered a right knee contusion after he collided with Jazz youngster Ace Bailey and later exited the game in the second quarter.

The injury also kept Ayton on the shelf for the Lakers’ recent bout against the Los Angeles Clippers earlier this week, but he’s set to return to the lineup against the Dallas Mavericks on Friday night. Before his return, Ayton opened up about the injury scare.

Ayton has battled availability woes at times in the NBA, as he hasn’t played in 70-plus games in a single season since doing so as rookie in the 2018-19 campaign. However, he’s done a pretty good job of keeping himself out of harm’s way in his maiden season as a Laker, as he’s missed only two of their 17 games played thus far.

The Lakers surely want Ayton to avoid the injury bug as much as possible, as he’s given them great production when at full strength. In each of his last three games prior to the Jazz game he went down in, he totaled 20-plus points and 10-plus rebounds. Moreover, he’s averaging 15.5 points per game while shooting a career-high 69.6 percent from the field this season.

With Ayton on the shelf, backup center Jaxson Hayes was the Lakers’ starting man in the middle against the Clippers a few days back. While he played a fine game in Ayton’s absence, there’s a huge talent gap between the two centers.

Hopefully, Ayton will pick up where he left off before his knee injury and put together another performance where he totals 20-plus points and 10-plus rebounds against the Mavericks on Friday. Dallas has been one of the West’s worst teams and has just five wins all season heading into the Lakers game.