The Los Angeles Lakers’ 110-100 loss to the Indiana Pacers at Bankers Life Fieldhouse on Monday night did not feature one of Lonzo Ball’s finer offensive performances. The rookie out of UCLA took four shots from field—all threes, only one of which he made—and, though his eight assists were solid on paper, logged just two of those helpers following a prolific first quarter.

After the game, Lakers head coach Luke Walton didn’t sound particularly concerned about Zo’s aggression (or lack thereof), though he certainly sees the benefits of Ball looking to score more often.

“Sometimes, we’d like him to even be more aggressive, even if it causes turnovers or missed shots, just to continue to get reps at doing things,” Walton explained. “He does a nice job of reading and taking what the defense gives him.”

In Ball’s case, the defense typically affords him attempts from beyond the arc. Though Lonzo seemed to find his rhythm in February and early March, he’s struggled with his shot of late—as he did to start the 2017-18 NBA season—dropping his overall rate of success on threes to 31.5 percent.

“He’s pretty good at taking what the defense gives him on most nights,” Walton said, “On a lot of nights, that’s three-point shots because a lot of teams go under on him. He doesn’t normally get fixated on anything and try to force it.”

On the whole, the Lakers’ coach seemed to like the effort and activity he saw from Ball.

“I thought he was really good to start, really locked in, ready to go,” Walton said. “I feel like defensively most nights, he’s always tracking the ball and engaged.”

The problems for Lonzo, in Luke’s eyes, were an offensive game plan that favored Brook Lopez and Julius Randle inside and a team-wide defensive performance that didn’t yield enough opportunities to push the pace.

“I think tonight we were posting up so much that offensively we didn’t have him as involved as we need him,” Walton went on. “We had an advantage down low, so we kept going there.

“For us to get out and run and him to play make, we have to get stops and we weren’t getting very many stops in the game tonight. That was tough.”

Creating those kinds of quick scoring chances might not be much easier on Thursday, when the Lakers face Anthony Davis and the New Orleans Pelicans at the Smoothie King Center. Then again, with the Pelicans tracking 0.52 possessions per game behind L.A.’s league-leading pace, per NBA.com, a battle with The Brow’s squad could be exactly what Ball and the Purple and Gold need to get their tempo back up where it belongs.