Midway through the second quarter, Brown tripped on the court and James, who was protecting him, unintentionally collided with him. Then the two went down hard, Brown lying on his stomach with a back injury and James nursing his left knee.

Following the incident, Brown went to the Celtics’ locker room to get checked out while LeBron was benched and given treatment.

LeBron James was allowed to rejoin the game, which was fortunate for the Lakers. However, the team first listed Jaylen Brown’s return from a lower back injury as questionable, giving the Celtics a slight fright.

If both clubs had lost both players to injury, it would have been terrible. Fortunately, it turned out not to be the case. And because the fans at Crypto.com Arena didn’t have to suffer without James and Brown, Christmas was also salvaged for them.