The Clippers’ early scores materialize when they aren’t able to get the designed shot, but improvise nicely to work themselves clean looks beyond the arc off smart reads [1st, 10:52; 1st, 10:17]. Unfortunately, the Clippers can’t hit their open shots, particularly Steve Novak, who puts up a goose-egg on nine shots.
It’s nip and tuck through most of the first half, until the Wolves string together a strong sequence in the closing minutes before halftime, scoring on their final eight possessions of the half. Bassy Telfair gets an all-access pass to the paint, scoring on two straight possessions. On the first [2nd, 4:28], he takes Mike Taylor off the dribble with ease. There’s no help because DeAndre Jordan’s back is to the play. The second Telfair goal [2nd, 3:45] comes on a high S/R from Kevin Love, off which Telfair darts into the paint, encounters Brian Skinner, lands with a jump step, then falls back for a fadeaway. The next play down [2nd, 3:08], Fred Jones gambles on an entry pass into Ryan Gomes in the low left post from Brian Cardinal. This leaves Gomes with an easy path to the rim — again the help is late.
The Wolves are just setting the table. Cardinal beats Baron Davis off the dribble, though he’s wildly off on the layup. No worries, because Love outmuscles Skinner to collect the refuse. Love tips the ball in for another two [3rd, 2:28]. At [2nd, 1:44], Telfair beats Taylor again, breezing into the paint for a pull-up J. On the next set down, Mike Miller runs a fade cut, and Gomes fills the space left behind. Telfair finds him for an open deuce [2nd, 1:23]. Telfair then delivers a beauty to Gomes on a basket cut from the right baseline. Gomes blows the layup, but again, a Wolf collects his own miss for a putback [2nd, 0:51]. On the final set of the half out of a :20 timeout, Minnesota gets the ball into Love in the high post. He misses the turnaround jumper, but Gordon fails to box out Miller, who crashes the glass for a tip-in with :01 second left in the half. Brutal.
Even though the Clippers allow Minnesota an 117.5 efficiency in the first half, the Clips protect the ball enough to stay in it, coughing it up only three times in the half. They head to the break trailing only by six points.
The Clips come out of the locker room a mess. DeAndre Jordan either doesn’t realize or doesn’t feel compelled to follow Kevin Love out to the left wing where he’s deadly from 18. Love drains two FGAs from there in the opening two minutes of the second half to give Minnesota their first double-digit lead. Jordan gets the message, and the next time down he runs out on Love, but in somewhat of a frenzy. This allows Love to put it on the deck and easily beat Jordan off the dribble for a layup. Love now has seven points in the first two minutes of the half. The Clips catch a break on the next Wolves’ possession when Love gets whistled for his fourth foul and is banished to the bench.
Once Love exits, the Clippers’ defense converts to a zone and, sure enough, they give up five offensive rebounds to the Wolves on the next four possessions. Someone smart needs to look at the data, but my best guess is that any advantage in defensive efficiency that’s derived from zoning up is negated by the additional possessions/attempts generated by the offensive glass. Finally, having watched a six-point deficit balloon to 11, the Clippers return for a few series to their man-to-man defense. Later, they revert back to zone and once again hemorrhage on the glass. It really is a lose-lose situation, especially once DeAndre Jordan goes down with a sprained Achilles in the third quarter. Skinner and Novak simply don’t have the ability to compete with Minnesota’s front line on the glass. To compound the Clippers’ problems, Miller and Gomes have huge size advantages on Jones and Gordon respectively.
Final rebounding totals
Clippers DRR: 53.5% [!]
Clippers ORR: 20.8% [...]
Gordon compiles a true shooting percentage of 73.7% tonight for 28 points, without a turn. Eight of the ten FGMs are from the perimeter, another two on assertive moves of the basket. Ideally, the ratio would be a bit narrower, but when you’re feeling it like Eric is tonight, 4:1 is just fine. Best of all, he’s honing his ability to move along the arc to find not only the best spots, but good angles for the passer to hit him with a clean pass.
Brian Skinner puts together a solid effort. That little lefty hook at [3rd, 3:20] impresses, as does his ability to work himself five trips to the line.
The Clippers tie Washington tonight for the league’s second-worst record, though the Bullets spend three of their final four games on the road.
24 Responses
Nice Fire Dunleavy chants during the game.
Posted on April 8th, 2009 at 12:26 am
File this one under “all’s well that ends badly.”
Posted on April 8th, 2009 at 12:47 am
I don’t think we can catch washington since they are playing Bos, Cleve, Tor. Clippers have a OKA and SAC Still.
Sam Mays Reply:
April 8th, 2009 at 8:20 am
What, you don’t think Baron will find a way to tank against OKA and SAC? Come on, this is the ultimate team guy… I can see him putting up at 2-15 and a 3-14 in those two games… And Zach could be back soon, which should help lose by even more… 18 and 64 has a nice sound… My only regret is the hot start.
Q.D. Reply:
April 8th, 2009 at 10:46 am
Zbo has sacrificed 2 games for the team recently, Team player MVP
Posted on April 8th, 2009 at 7:36 am
I dont know about you guys, but this game was damn near unwatchable for me. I was cringing in my seat at Staples Center the entire game. I was waiting for something to happen for 2 hours. All i got was a team that simply doesnt give a crap anymore.
Season ticket holder for 8 years… that was the first time i ever left a game early.
Posted on April 8th, 2009 at 9:02 am
Remember Olowakandi & Chris Kaman? Drafting big man on top pick is a huge gamble. They all look PRETTY AMAZING during their ‘testo’ driven young college career.
Even if we win to pick #1, we should draft RICKY RUBIO. That should be our #1 priority. He’s a winner.
PLEASE DO NOT FALL UNDER BLAKE GRIFFIN TEMPTATION.
EricGordonsAnkleBrace Reply:
April 8th, 2009 at 10:34 am
Yes, pick Rubio so we can F-up the buyout of his contract and have him stay in Europe and end up with no player with our high pick. great plan.
Stay away from Blake Griffin Reply:
April 8th, 2009 at 11:25 am
Dunleavy is 110% serious about RUBIO. He’s going to Europe to watch him play before the draft.
Sam Mays Reply:
April 8th, 2009 at 11:55 am
Blake Griffin is the only lock in the draft. Amazing player with a great motor. He is not Tyson Chandler, an untested high school kid. Blake Griffin is a player you can build around… One who can move into the starting lineup on day one in place of Z-bo, who can be dumped if we can find a team with a GM as stupid as Dunleavy… They’ll look at Rubio for one reason. We don’t get the #1 pick… Griffin is the top player on the board in EVERYONE’S BOOK.
Stay away from Blake Griffin Reply:
April 8th, 2009 at 12:13 pm
Olowakandi was also a top pick.
benoit benjamin's two left shoes Reply:
April 8th, 2009 at 2:02 pm
Not a valid comparison. Kandiman had only played basketball for a few years, and went to UOP as I recall. Kaman, who is a serviceable big man and who still could be special, didn’t even play in a mid-major conference did he? Central Michigan was his college I believe (BTW: anytime you put a geographic qualifier before your state name, you pretty much can’t consider the school a basketball powerhouse).
Griffin seems to have the body of a Greg Oden (not to mention the hops of an MJ), but with a better head attached to it.
I’d would take him if we get the chance. Rubio’s defense and shooting are suspect, and we all know how MDSr’s last Euro pick turned out!
Section 113 Reply:
April 8th, 2009 at 2:55 pm
All picks come with some uncertainty…big men or little men. Dunce is going to go watch him before the draft, who cares…I am willing to bet that DUNCE is gone, even with the 2 years remaining. Rubio’s defense suspect? That was what all the raves were about in the Olympics how strong a defender he was…and yes his shooting is suspect, but so was Magic JOhnson’s coming out of college…Here is why they should draft him, they need to put people into the seats, Rubio is also entertaining, bug men don’t sell tickets, little guys do….we’re never going to win anyway, so let’s go for entertaining.
FireDunleavy .com Reply:
April 8th, 2009 at 3:55 pm
Dunleavy is going to Europe to party on the Clippers credit card. They’re gonna pick that 7ft3 center from ucon
Posted on April 8th, 2009 at 10:17 am
Always it’s safe to sign a restricted free agent or a proven veteran for Center/PF position.(We did a great job by acquiring BRAND by trading Chandler.
Remember Tyson Chandler? We’ll thought he’s a great prospect!
These big men come in with BIG risk factor. We just can’t afford to go thru that %@*t again & again.
Posted on April 8th, 2009 at 10:36 am
I’m sure you know this KA, but if you’re playing zone, the players know they’re screwed if they don’t box out. The only time zone is effective is when players box out, or else it is a complete disaster.
Your proposed test couldn’t be done legitimately because the more disciplined teams will box out, and the ones that are not disciplined defensively, or are undersized (in both cases, the Clippers) won’t box out. If you were to do your efficiency test on both sets of teams, then you’d get the data that makes sense: the teams that box out have a good defensive efficiency when they switch to zone, and the teams that don’t box out don’t have a good efficiency.
But again, for all I know, the data can prove me wrong. Bring on the data!
Kevin Arnovitz Reply:
April 8th, 2009 at 12:01 pm
Ajay:
Completely understand what you’re saying, though I don’t think the only variable here is effort/boxing out. Simply speaking, a defensive player can’t box out an offensive player if that defensive player is not in close proximity to him. Even the best rebounder, if he’s on the strong side of an offensive overload, is screwed. If the miss falls off to weak side, he’s not there. If it comes to the strong side, then he has two, maybe three guys from the offensive team to contend with.
ka
Stay away from Blake Griffin Reply:
April 8th, 2009 at 12:16 pm
Mobley & Ross played well for Clippers at defensive end. Now we see major HOLE in all corners.
Posted on April 8th, 2009 at 10:46 am
FIRE DUNLEAVY ALREADY!!!
Posted on April 8th, 2009 at 12:45 pm
as long as the Clips lose every game this season, and Sacramento is able to pull off a win against Minnesota for their last game, the Clippers would tie for the worst record in the league with Sacramento (who has beaten us 3 times this season) and Washington (we split the season series). Sadly none of these things seem too unrealistic.
Posted on April 8th, 2009 at 3:53 pm
If we tie with Sacramento, we will get more ping pong balls than they do on account of them sweeping us this year (if we lose on Friday). With Washington, it depends on the division record…and I think we’re more wretched than they are…
Posted on April 8th, 2009 at 4:46 pm
Doesnt really matter… to quote rick pitino:
LEBRON JAMES IS NOT WALKING THROUGH THAT DOOR
TIM DUNCAN IS NOT WALKING THROUGH THAT DOOR
DWIGHT HOWARD IS NOT WALKING THROUGH THAT DOOR
CHRIS PAUL IS NOT WALKING THROUGH THAT DOOR
Ricky Rubio? Blake Griffin? AND that’s if we’re lucky enough to get a top 2 pick…!!!!
Kill me. Over and over again. Kill me. (metallica’s “one”– jonny’s got his gun video).
Posted on April 8th, 2009 at 4:57 pm
Dig the Bullets reference. That’s old school.
Posted on April 8th, 2009 at 7:25 pm
this game was really unwatchable. honestly it was like a cockfighting match. women and children should have been banned and it should have taken place in a backyard in santa ana. it was that bad. as i was approaching staples the crowd seemed really excited. then i realized it was the nokia crowd lined up to see megadeath.
i love the ‘dunleavy is going to europe to scout rubio.’ yeah just like he scouted koralev.
Posted on April 10th, 2009 at 3:38 pm
Trackbacks