Monday matinee vs. Pacers – Orange County Register

Bright side for the Clippers: After failing to figure out how to get the ball over the basket for long stretches, including, most importantly, the last 4 minutes, 18 seconds of Saturday’s loss in San Antonio, they didn’t have to wait two days to earn another match and score in the basket.

And they have to do it at home, aiming for familiar rims, and that’s against the Indiana Pacers, who are 15-28 leading and have lost nine of their past 10 games.

Otherwise: 12:30 p.m. starting on Martin Luther King Jr. Day, just two days after coughing back in San Antonio, doesn’t give Tyronn Lue much time to readjust or the men playing for him – who’ could conceivably have played basketball for most of their lives – to figure out how to end their break fast.

What’s more, it’s not like the Clippers can even pack their suitcases – after Monday’s carnival, they’re right back on the road for the final eight games and 4,745 miles above the month’s merciless, merciless schedule. January.

And it’s not as if the Spurs (now 16-27) were on fire before they shut down the Clippers 101-94. No, they’ve also lost nine out of 10 – including one the night before.

“We’re just trying to figure that out,” said third-year winger Terance Mann, who – wood knocker – has been one of two contributors the Clippers have had to do for as many games this season due to injury or health and safety protocols.

Mann spoke, via Zoom, Friday in New Orleans, where he scored the top 15 on the team. lose 113-89: “I mean, it’s not easy. We don’t practice because we play every other day. I mean, we just have a different mix of people that we don’t have yet. And yes, every game is different because we don’t practice. Sometimes it’s the different looks, we just have to figure it out. ”

Or as Lue likes to say: “We just have to keep playing the right way.” But even then, they still have to: “Do some shooting, and I think everything else will be fine.”

In that, the challenge for a Clippers team (21-23) is averaging 99.6 points per game at a league low in January. It’s a symptom of living without injury All-Stars Kawhi Leonard and Paul George, who remain sidelined indefinitely – plus, for eight games and on, keeper Luke Kennard is shooting 44 .1% from 3 point range this season but who has been on the protocol since Jan 1st.

“I think we played the right way, trying to get into the paint, trying to play the right way,” Lue said on Saturday night. “We didn’t do the early shoot.”

Or late.

Or, basically, outside of the third half when Amir Coffey and Serge Ibaka picked for the Clippers, combining to go 6-7 for 16 of the team’s 33 points in this period, ending with the Clippers 85-80 ahead. and are on the cusp of taking control despite being 16 points behind.

But when Ibaka left the floor after 13 consecutive minutes at 92-92 at 5:12, the Clippers boom began to explode.

Nicolas Batum scored four points in the fourth quarter, but Marcus Morris Sr failed to muster any points in this period, nor did veterans like Eric Bledsoe or Reggie Jackson – who missed his only free-throw attempt. Clippers in the inning, in a game game when they reached the free-throw line only eight times. That’s 10 times less than they usually do, which is on average, less than all but two teams in the NBA.

Closing Saturday was a microcosm of the Clippers’ past seven games following their unlikely New Year’s Day win in Brooklyn.

Morris has done admirably heavy lifting for a considerable amount of time, scoring 20 or more points in 10 of 13 games. But on average over the past seven games, he’s scored 17.5 points and has shot 39.8% from the pitch and 35% from deep (and 13.5 out of 33.3% in the last four games).

Similarly, Batum’s shooting rate in the last 7 games: 39.5% and 30.8%.