Skyler’s Swishes: To Live and Die in L.A.

“Skyler’s Swishes” is a column by Skyler Trepel covering the week’s top basketball events.

This week’s swishes feature a legend who spoke at USC making his first finals appearance, a California native balling out before a loss and a USC alum posterizing an NBA superstar.

Chris Paul leads the Phoenix Suns to the Western Conference Finals with win at Staples Center

The last time the Phoenix Suns made the NBA Finals in 1993, Chris Paul was eight years old. Now he is 36 years old in year 16 of his NBA career, and the “point god” has just earned his first appearance in the NBA Finals.

Paul spoke to USC students earlier this year about life in the NBA bubble, but no one could have expected him to help lead the Phoenix Suns to an NBA Finals appearance less than a year later. Paul was hitting 3-pointers like this one all night with fancy dribble moves galore on his way to hitting 7-of-8 threes.

Paul scored 41 points, including 31 in the second half, to go along with eight assists, seven rebounds and an astounding zero turnovers. Paul also won this game with head coach Monty Williams who he played for ten years earlier in New Orleans.

Paul led the Clippers from an abyss of mediocrity to a perennial playoff team in the 2010s, so he wasn’t shy in mentioning how much it meant to win the Western Conference Finals in Los Angeles. The Suns have never won an NBA championship, but with Paul leading the young core of rising stars, including Devin Booker and Deandre Ayton, it seems as though that could change.

Paul George balls out for Los Angeles in Game 5 win

The Los Angeles Clippers are now eliminated, but the man formerly known as “Pandemic P” found some form of redemption as he dropped a playoff career-high 41 points. Paul George, who once proclaimed himself “Playoff P,” may have missed two clutch free-throws earlier in the series, but stepped up when the Clippers needed him.

While George has never won a championship, he did lead the Indiana Pacers to the Eastern Conference Finals during the 2013 and 2014 playoffs. However, referring to himself as an all-time great playoff performer without a finals appearance led to many pundits calling him out.

Not only did George have a great performance on Monday, but he did so without superstar teammate Kawhi Leonard due to injury. George was scoring any way he wanted with a barrage of 3-pointers and strong inside finishes including 20 points in the third quarter.

He was also a menace on the boards as he racked up 13 rebounds and even found time to dish out six assists. With the Clippers now eliminated some people may start up the Paul George jokes again, but it’s important not to forget that he was able to put up a massive performance in an elimination game where he was the leader.

Onyeka Okongwu posterizes Giannis Antetokounmpo

Onyeka Okongwu was a standout player on the USC men’s basketball team during the 2019-20 season. He was known as an interior force, but in Game 3 of the Atlanta Hawks’ series against the Milwaukee Bucks on Sunday he brought that force to the big time.

The Hawks needed to keep up with the Bucks as they were down 91-88 with less than ten minutes to go in the fourth quarter. That’s when former Los Angeles Clipper Lou Williams dished the ball to Okongwu for the alley-oop finish in midair.

Okongwu rose up high before slamming it down so hard he fell to the ground. Not only did he throw it down, but he did so over the outstretched arm of two-time MVP and one of the NBA’s best defenders: Giannis Antetokounmpo.

While Okongwu is not a star player for the Atlanta Hawks, the fact that he has gotten minutes in the Eastern Conference Finals and made plays during his rookie season can set him up to be another successful Trojan in the NBA.