Austin Reaves fires back at allegations of free-throw grifting lobbed at him, Shai Gilgeous-Alexander

LOS ANGELES – The Los Angeles Lakers know that coming into their Western Conference Semifinal series against the Oklahoma City Thunder, one thing they’re going to have to watch out for is Thunder star Shai Gilgeous-Alexander’s ability to draw fouls and get free-throws. But the Lakers believe they have a free-throw counter of their own in Austin Reaves.

Over the past couple of seasons, Austin Reaves has emerged as one of the better players in the NBA at getting contact, and he was second on the Lakers this season in free-throw attempts. And Shai Gilgeous-Alexander is arguably the best in the league at drawing fouls and getting to the free-throw line.

But both players’ ability to get to the line have drawn criticism amongst fellow players, fans and media alike with the label, ‘free-throw merchant’ being thrown around. But if you ask Reaves, there’s nothing malicious about it. It’s simply using a skill to have a better chance at winning, as he explained following Lakers’ practice on Sunday.

“I know it’s a tough topic to talk about because everybody blows it out of proportion, but at the end of the day, he [Shai] wants to win and he’s going to do whatever it takes to win. If he shoots 20 free-throws, so be it. If I shoot 20 free-throws, I’ll be happy,” Reaves said. “I don’t think there’s any bad intentions with trying to get to the line. I think it’s … somewhat of, I don’t know if I call it an art, but how many possessions he has the ball in his hands and how much he does attack, they’re not gonna shoot zero free-throws.”

Throughout the playoffs so far, Gilgeous-Alexander is leading the league in free-throw attempts at 12.3 per game. During the regular season, he was at 9.0, good enough for fourth in the NBA behind Reaves’ Lakers teammate Luka Doncic (10.1), Giannis Antetokounmpo (9.9) and Deni Avdija (9.2).

But as far as Reaves goes, he actually doesn’t rank very high on the free-throw attempts list considering the reputation he’s received. This year he shot a career-high 7.3 attempts from the line. Prior to that he had never attempted more than five free-throws per game.

When it comes to the playoffs, Reaves had never averaged more than 3.8 free-throw attempts before this season. In the two games he played against the Houston Rockets, he’s right at seven per game.

It’s Reaves’ ball-handling and penchant for getting downhill, similarly to Gilgeous-Alexander, that leads to drawing contact. During the first four games of the Rockets’ series, it was that ability to put pressure on the defense that the Lakers missed from their backcourt.

While the Lakers are certainly mindful of Gilgeous-Alexander’s tendency to draw fouls, Thunder head coach Mark Daigneault is preparing in a similar way for Reaves, as per Clemente Almanza of Thunder Wire.

“They’re adding an extremely high usage player that’s great at drawing fouls, really savvy shooter at all three levels,” Daigneault said. “He’s just a very crafty, skilled player and someone that they can play through, somebody they can give the ball to and generate offense for them.”

And on the Lakers’ side, they know slowing down the reigning MVP is not going to be an easy task.

“[He’s] Very professional at putting the ball in the basket at all three levels. He shoots the three, obviously the midrange, he gets inside the paint and obviously shoots a lot of free-throws,” Reaves said. “When you do that at a high efficiency, it’s gonna be tough … he shoots a lot of free-throws. I shoot a lot of free-throws too, so it’s fine.”

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