Facing the NBA’s top team and one of the league’s elite players, the Clippers needed to be at their best Sunday if they were to extend their winning streak to six games.
But they failed to deliver in the final seconds against the Oklahoma City Thunder and Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, losing 103-101 in a tense battle at the Intuit Dome.
“A lot of turnovers. Even at the end of the fourth, we had two or three turnovers at the end,” Kawhi Leonard said. “Yeah, we fought hard. We was in the game the whole game. Just calls could have gone either way. But salute to them. They’ve been the best team in the league.”
The Clippers missed an opportunity to tie the game when Derrick Jones Jr. made only one of two free throws with 1:22 left, leaving the Clippers down 101-100 before things really started to unravel.
Read more: James Harden scores 30 as red-hot Clippers pick up their fifth straight win
Two costly turnovers, including one by Ivica Zubac after he fumbled the ball out of bounds with 1:01 left, ended one chance to take the lead. Then, with 21 seconds left, Norman Powell missed a shot, and after Zubac got the offensive rebound, Kawhi Leonard missed a shot with four seconds remaining.
The loss dropped the Clippers (40-31) to eighth in an increasingly tight Western Conference postseason race. They are one game out of sixth place for the final automatic playoff berth with 11 games left.
“I already played in the play-in and I ain’t trying to do that again,” said Powell, who finished with nine points. “So, you’re watching closely on positioning, wanting teams to lose, want to keep the way we’re playing going. Bounce back on this road trip. But, yeah, definitely, everybody is trying to avoid that play-in right now.”
Gilgeous-Alexander, held to seven-for-29 shooting from the floor, finished with 26 points. He made all 11 of his free-throw attempts, including two in the final seconds.
Leonard had 25 points and 10 rebounds. James Harden, who finished with 17 points, moved past Moses Malone for 11th on the NBA’s all-time scoring list. Zubac had 15 points and 11 rebounds.
After the game, Harden limped around the locker room. He had been kneed in the left thigh by Thunder guard Luguentz Dort in the third quarter. Harden said he rolled his foot during the play.
The Thunder, who swept the season series against the Clippers, have the NBA’s best record at 59-12 and the league’s leading scorer and most valuable player candidate in Gilgeous-Alexander (32.9 points per game).
It wasn’t all bad news for the Clippers — coach Tyronn Lue was back on the sideline. He missed five of the previous seven games because of back pain, with the Clippers going 6-1 over that stretch with assistant coach Brian Shaw at the helm.
Lue thanked his coaching staff for keeping the team in good shape.
“I feel a lot better,” Lue said. “I’m just going to take it day by day, game by game. … The pain from my shoulder and back kind of went down my leg a little bit. … I feel really good as far as my back and shoulder. Now, it’s just trying to get the leg part better, but I do feel better from that regard. That’s what was giving me the most problems.”
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This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
