LOS ANGELES — An event 68 games in the making finally happened on Monday night: The Lakers played their small-ball starting lineup for the sixth time of the season.

That might seem like an unremarkable marker, and for any other NBA team it probably is. But for the Lakers, their lineup of LeBron James at center with Russell Westbrook, Malik Monk, Austin Reaves and Stanley Johnson is now their most-played starting lineup of the season.

It’s an indication of the ugly injury situation which has dogged the team all year, in addition to their inconsistent play. Coach Frank Vogel has spent most of the season pulling strings, never starting any one group more than five times before Monday against the Toronto Raptors. The Lakers have played 32 different starting lineups this season.

With Anthony Davis shelved, the Lakers entered Monday night at 7-6 when James plays center. While it hasn’t led to as many wins as the team had hoped for lately, the 37-year-old seemed to buy that sticking to one group was a better option than continuing to probe.

“It’s a small dosage obviously but I mean we’ve had so many different lineup changes this year and trying to figure out ways which ones works the best that’s probably been the only one that’s been above .500,” he said. “So we’ve tried to stick with it. We’ve tried to have some consistency with some lineups.”

It wasn’t a sure thing that the group would get together for Monday’s game. It was widely believed among the team that James, who has been dealing with left knee soreness, might take the second night of a back-to-back off after playing 30 minutes with 31 points against Phoenix. But after warming up, James decided to play in what Vogel described as a “true game-time decision.”

The Lakers and James himself have acknowledged that the knee – that has caused him to miss six games over the last two months – is still bothering James even though he has maintained his assault on the NBA’s scoring leaders. The Lakers have a road back-to-back later this week, visiting Toronto on Friday before flying to Washington for a game on Saturday.

James said last week that the team’s tenuous place in the standings hasn’t motivated him to play through an injury that he normally might sit for.

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“I probably would be in uniform no matter what,” he said. “No matter if we were nine games under .500 or nine games above .500. It’s just all dependent on how it feels.”

The Lakers already have few options for starters, but those choices got even slimmer on Monday afternoon when the team announced that veteran center Dwight Howard would miss the Raptors game because of a family emergency. The team said he hoped to join the team on the upcoming road trip.

Softening the blow of losing their only remaining center: two-way contract player Wenyen Gabriel, who has earned minutes since signing with the team two weeks ago. The spindly 6-foot-9 forward remains a project in his third NBA season, but after being wary of his youth, Vogel seems to be warming to throwing him into games as a change-of-pace hustle player.

“He’s got a compelling skill set,” Vogel said. “Very athletic and long. He can make plays defensively, rebound the basketball, rim protection, just having a physical presence out there. And energetic youth around LeBron has been successful for us this year. So he’s shown a little bit of that early on.”