Stephon Castle Stats Tonight: How did Spurs ROTY favorite fare against the Lakers? (March. 17)

Stephon Castle has been a bright spark for the San Antonio Spurs all season and has stepped up in Victor Wembanyama's absence since the Frenchman's season-ending injury. On Monday night against the Lakers, he got into foul trouble early and was consigned to the bench early in the first quarter without troubling the box score in any category.

Stephon Castle's ice cold scoring stroke continued in the second quarter as he missed five of his seven field goal attempts as the Lakers continued to pull away from the Spurs who looked increasingly outmatched in the absence of their two stars Victor Wembanyama and De'Aaron Fox.

Castle continued his poor shooting into the third quarter missing a mid-range jumper from 8-feet out and a tip from a contested rebound. He nailed his second three pointer of the game to make the score (56-71) with nine minutes remaining in the third quarter but that was his last offensive contribution of the night.

With the game's result a foregone conclusion, Stephon Castle showed some of his pedigree, making four of his seven field goal attempts which included a three-pointer assisted by Blake Wesley.

With the loss (125-109), the Spurs fell to 28-39 for the season, falling further outside of play-in contention. With this impressive victory, the Lakers improved to 42-25, positioning themselves well for the second seed in the West, only two games behind the Rockets and the Nuggets who both own identical records.

Here are Stephon Castle's stats from the night:

Players	PTS	REB	AST	STL	BLK	TO	PF	MIN	FG	3PT	FT	+/-
Stephon Castle	23	8	3	0	0	2	5	27:33	8-19	3-6	4-6	-8

Stephon Castle makes his feelings clear about Spurs loss to Lakers

Despite losing their 39th game of the season, the Spurs rookie remained upbeat about the team's future and seemed to take the loss on the chin as a learning experience. In the post-game press conference, he said:

"I was happy. We stayed in the fight. Nobody really hanged their head or gave up. We kept playing through the end"

Castle's veteran teammate Chris Paul also extolled the benefits of Castle's toils on defense despite getting in foul trouble early. The 40-year-old Point Guard shared his feelings in the post game press conference, saying:

"There’s no teacher like playing, so the fact that he’s getting in-game reps. He gets a chance to see what it looks like in live action. [It’s] only going to continue to help him.” - Chris Paul on Stephon Castle

The Spurs will return to Frost Bank Arena to start a three-game home stand against the New York Knicks on Wednesday.