The Los Angeles Lakers might not have been swept by the Oklahoma City Thunder with Luka Dončić out there, but Lakers fans also need to be real: LA wasn't getting past the Thunder this season, even with a full and healthy roster.
Speaking of roster, the Lakers' roster simply wasn't good enough this season to seriously compete against a Western Conference power like OKC or the San Antonio Spurs. It's a depth problem, and one that general manager Rob Pelinka will be tasked with fixing this offseason.
Even if Luka and Austin Reaves had been healthy for this series, that wouldn't have changed the fact that the Thunder's bench players are far superior to LA's. Guys like Jared McCain and Isaiah Joe killed the Lakers in this series, and OKC's bench overall outscored the Lakers' bench in all four games. While the Lakers did an admirable job on Shai Gilgeous-Alexander (through the first three games, anyway), so many of the Thunder's role players hurt them.
Lakers shouldn't feel like this was a lost season
It's tempting for Lakers fans to assume that LA would have had a shot to beat OKC with a healthy Luka, but it's also not logical. Maybe it's for the best, by the way, to realize this truth head-on, else the Lakers' season is at risk for being remembered as a contention year squandered by injury. The truth is, the Lakers weren't contenders this season, even with everyone feeling great. As aforementioned, they lacked the depth to keep up with this OKC juggernaut, which is now 8-0 in the postseason and headed to another Western Conference Finals.
Austin Reaves' struggles against the Thunder are real
Reaves wasn't good against OKC in any of the meetings earlier this season, and that was when he was much healthier. This is another reason why the Thunder are such a tough matchup for LA -- they tend to give Reaves fits. While Austin did tally a 31-point game in this series, he was, on the whole, ineffective. That can largely be attributed to his oblique (which isn't fully healed, clearly), but one also can't ignore the fact that AR struggles to look like himself against OKC, in general.
To compete with this team next year, the Lakers need to add at least two quality wings who are athletic and long enough to match the type of energy OKC brings to the table. In next year's playoffs, the Thunder might be going for their third-straight title. It would be glorious if the Lakers had the roster to take them down and prevent a three-peat. We'll see what Pelinka can pull off this summer.
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