On Sunday, the Los Angeles Clippers’ offensive struggles continued, as they fell to Luka Doncic and the Los Angeles Lakers, 102-108. It was their third loss in a row to their cross-town rivals and their fifth in a row to teams above .500.
The most notable storyline in this game was supposed to be the return of Norman Powell, who had missed his past five games due to a knee injury. However, after just eight minutes of play in the first quarter, Powell was forced to exit the game due to what the team reported as right hamstring soreness. With their leading scorer taken from them yet again, the Clippers’ offense reverted to looking just as it did in the games he missed: disjointed and inefficient.
The Clippers dug themselves into a hole in the first half, and they lacked the offensive power necessary to keep pace with Doncic and Dalton Knecht, who both had hot shooting nights, scoring 29 and 19 points, respectively.
Bogdan Bogdanoivcic, who’s been starting in place of Powell since the break, received a lot of minutes in his absence.
Unfortunately for the Clippers, Bodgonavic’s struggles weren’t alleviated off the bench. His inefficiency woes continued, as the Serbian shooting guard scored just 12 points on the night with 16 field-goal attempts.
James Harden also struggled yet again, as he shot just 4-for-14 from the field and 2-for-9 from 3-point range, missing many uncontested mid-range jumpers and 3-pointers.
It was one of many recent shaky performances, as it’s his third time in the past five games shooting below 30% from the field.
In the absence of Powell, Harden’s offensive inconsistency puts more pressure on Leonard to carry the scoring load, which he did tonight. Leonard was the only Clipper to score above 20 points, as he had 33 points to go along with 10 rebounds. Leonard’s point total more than doubled that of the Clippers’ second leading scorer—with Bogdonavic and Harden struggling, he was the only shot creator on the Clippers who produced on the night.
While foul trouble kept him sidelined for the majority of the first half, Kris Dunn also had a solid offensive performance. The typically defensive-minded guard was aggressive to start the final two quarters of play, and he capitalized on several transition opportunities to keep the game within reach.
However, he went cold when the Clippers needed him most, missing three completely uncontested 3-pointers in a row in the last four minutes of play that could’ve cut the Lakers’ lead to just one possession.
The sole silver lining in this game for the blue and white was their defensive performance, most notably the job that they did in containing Lebron James. The Clippers held James to just 17 points on just 35% shooting from the field—his lowest point total and percentage in a game since December 2nd.
The Clippers made James uncomfortable all night, frequently forcing him into contested jumpers and stripping him on attempts to create scoring opportunities both from the post and through penetration.
It may not all show up in the stat sheet, but the Clippers also made things difficult for the entire Lakers team, not just James.
Even though he made a number of them, the vast majority of Doncic’s 29 points came on heavily contested 3-pointers. The Lakers also faced Doncic into six turnovers, including a particularly untimely giveaway with less than one minute left that created a transition opportunity for the Clippers that could’ve cut the Lakers’ lead to just three. However, a clutch chase-down block from James dashed any chances of a comeback, keeping the game out of reach for good.
With their second loss in a row and their fifth in their last six games, the Clippers have now gone from safely within the top six seeds in the Western Conference to a position where they’re fighting to stay out of the play-in.
The Clippers now still stand in the 6th seed in the West, however, the gap between them and the 10th seeded Dallas Mavericks is just 0.5 games. The race is tight—one or two losses could put them at the bottom of the playoff race.
Los Angeles is more dysfunctional than they’ve ever been this season, and worst of all, they have no more cushion to fall back on. They must rally through their discomfort to give themselves a winnable playoff scenario.
The Clippers next play the Suns in Phoenix on March 4 at 7 p.m.