The Los Angeles Lakers were defeated by the Orlando Magic by a final score of 120-101 on Saturday night. The game was never close. According to superstar LeBron James, the Lakers’ poor performance on the offensive glass was a major factor in their loss. The offensive rebounding score was 19-10, Los Angeles’s loss.

Goga Bitazde and Moritz Wagner, the team’s two big players, combined for nine offensive rebounds, which is close to the Lakers’ total. It was the beginning of a wider trend that has been detrimental to the Lakers this season and drew their record to 3-3. The Lakers are currently allowing the ninth-most offensive rebounds per game at 11.3.

According to Spectrum SportsNet, James is aware of the problem that has plagued the Lakers this season and realizes it needs to be fixed as soon as possible.

“We’ve got to try and figure it out because it’s obviously been our tendency. Points scored from offensive boards and offensive rebounds. We’re really effective at halting the opposition on their opening possession, but we need to do a better job of preventing offensive rebounds and points from those. That’s a secret we need to keep, and accomplishing that will be a worthy endeavor.

Jarred Vanderbilt, Rui Hachimura, and Taurean Prince would be tremendous assets on the glass, thus it would be remiss not to highlight their ailments while discussing the team’s difficulties. James thinks the Lakers’ problems go deeper than a simple failure to box out:

It’s not as easy as just punching your way out. Simply said, if a guy is larger than you, he is larger than you. We’ve seen it multiple times: you can box out and yet come up short in the offensive rebounding battle. Having Rui, Vando, and TP, three of our larger players, out there is a huge help. Yet, when we do reach out, we need to be more effective in our assistance. A free crasher will occasionally show up when we’re double teaming guys. Sometimes we just stand about and watch the game, which leads to us giving away offensive boards. It’s something we need to analyze on film to figure out how to improve.

James also looked forward at the Lakers’ schedule and cautioned his team that things would not get easier and that the Lakers would need to find a way to not be beat so badly on the offensive glass despite the absence of key players.

What I mean is that some squads are more prone to crashes than others. We just need to do a better job of defending the glass against Orlando, who is one of those teams that often sends several players there. I have no doubt that Miami will give it their all on Monday; we all know the type of game that will be. We play Phoenix on Friday, and Josh Okogie is a guy that crashes alone, and he’s like two or three offensive rebound guys by himself; Houston is young and athletic, so they definitely send a lot of guys to the glass, too. It’s just that we need to get better at recognizing it.

Offensive rebounds will improve once Vanderbilt, Hachimura, and Prince return. The Lakers can’t afford to continue to get outrebounded like they did against Orlando and give up second chance points until those three return, which could be many weeks.

With so many players out, they had a harder time making mistakes against the Magic on Saturday.