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The Clippers blew their first chance to advance to the conference finals on Friday, but they will get two more. Here are three numbers that stand out from Los Angeles’ Game 5 loss.
36: Kawhi leonardtotal score
It wasn’t all bad for the Clippers despite the loss. Leonard was on mild offensive funk early on in this series, but he firmly broke with that. He was living in the early lane, even throwing two dunks and generally getting the looks he wanted both in the midrange and in the basket. When the Nuggets pushed him the most, he was doing the right reads to find open teammates, even if they didn’t always convert.
About the only technical problem Leonard had on offense was when he missed two shots near the basket with the Clippers leading 88-86 in the fourth quarter. Jerami Grant defended him, but Leonard had two chances to extend the lead; Instead, Nikola Jokic hit a three at the other end, and the Nuggets held the lead the rest of the way.
Still, Leonard was the only consistent offense the Clippers had down the stretch. He even created two open 3s for Paul George and Lou Williams that didn’t go down. His 36 points, nine rebounds and four assists gave the Clippers a chance to win.
16: Clippers bench points
The Clippers led the league with 50.3 bench points per game during the regular season, driven by 18 points each from Williams and Montrezl Harrell. Despite leading the league in points per game during the playoffs, the Clippers are only getting 36.5 points per game off their bench in the postseason. Even that number would have been enough in Game 5, when the Los Angeles bench went cold.
The Los Angeles bench scored 16 points on 7 of 20 shots, dropped in particular by Williams when he hit 2 of 10 from the field and missed all five of his 3-pointers. Most of Williams’s looks, particularly those inside the arc, were quality shots. But he’s now 10-for-45 on 3-pointers in the postseason, and at this point, he can’t be relied on as an offensive option in close games. The Nuggets deliberately sent two to the ball handler and let Williams take three in the fourth quarter. If you’re not getting it right, Landry Shamet makes more sense in those situations.
The starters provided enough offense for the Clippers to win on Friday, but the bench, which is undoubtedly a bit shorter now that Doc Rivers has beefed up the rotation, didn’t get the job done.
+16: Nikola Jokicis plus-minus against Montrezl harrell
In the first round, the Clippers found that pairing Harrell with Boban Marjanovic was a losing proposition. Marjanovic was simply too big for Harrell to deal with. There is a similar dynamic at play in the second round, another great Serbian center who is getting his way with Harrell. Nikola Jokic isn’t Boban’s size, no one is, but he’s tall enough and too slick for Harrell to defend effectively.
The two shared the floor for just over eight minutes in Game 5. During that time, the Nuggets outscored the Clippers by 16 points. For context, they only won the game by five.
All of the worst fears the Clippers could have about the Jokic-Harrell showdown came down the stretch against Denver. When Jokic was in the booth surveying the rest of the floor, Harrell was too small to deter any passing since he is at least five inches shorter than Jokic. It also failed to provide significant competition in Jokic jumpers. When Jokic and Jamal Murray ran a pick-and-pop, Harrell still fell despite being literally on the court to defend Jokic on the perimeter.
Defensively, Harrell doesn’t provide any space, so Jokic could camp on the lane. He stayed home on every Harrell post move and used his raw size to compete with the Clippers’ sixth man in the paint, which turned out to be effective most of the time.
Ivica Zubac didn’t have a great game, and Rivers was understandably not wanting to get back with him, even though Zubac has the length to make life a bit difficult for Jokic. But the Clippers have two options of five small-ball centers in JaMychal Green and Marcus Morris Sr. Even if neither of them could defend Jokic, which was already happening, both would force Jokic to leave the paint on defense and make him work. in that. final. With Harrell in the game, Jokic felt comfortable on both ends of the court as he and Murray spearheaded the return of the Nuggets.
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