The Riverside Press-Enterprise
Tested Clippers return from long trip, bonded and rolling
Twelve days, seven cities, six victories.
The Clippers’ recent stretch of games that took them from Toronto to Atlanta tested not only the team’s resolve to maintain its status among the NBA’S best teams, but its defense.
Throughout the Grammy-induced trip, the Clippers found themselves trailing early or battling to hold onto leads late in games and using their explosive offensive power to propel them to victories.
So glaring were their defensive struggles that after beating the Detroit Pistons in which they trailed early, Kawhi Leonard uncharacteristically spoke out and suggested the Clippers were winning games largely on their talent and that they needed to “be focused on execution.”
Leonard wasn’t wrong. After beating the Atlanta Hawks on Monday in a 149144 shootout to go 6-1 on the trip, Coach Tyronn Lue pointed to the team’s sporadic defensive lapses. The Clippers’ lone setback was a 10-point loss on Jan. 29 to another of the league’s hottest teams, the Cleveland Cavaliers.
“This was a hell of a trip for us, you know. We go six and one against the caliber of teams we played on this trip. Coming into I, we knew it was going to be a tough battle,” Lue said after the Atlanta game.
Despite their defensive inconsistencies, the Heading into tonight’s home game against New Orleans, the Clippers are a halfgame out of the top spot in the Western Conference. They remain confident and committed to their goal of a title, strengthened by what they accomplished on the road.
“We bonded on the road,” Leonard said Monday in an on-court postgame
interview. “It’s very tough on the road and we were able to get it done.”
--Janis Carr • Anthony Davis had 26 points, 15 rebounds and 11 assists for his third career triple-double as the Lakers won 124-118 at Charlotte late on Monday.
D’angelo Russell scored 28 points and Lebron James added 26 for Lakers (27-25), who have won three in a row and finished 4-2 on their Grammy trip.
“When we put our minds to it, we can beat any team in this league,” Davis said. “We lost two we felt like we should have won, and we won two that the people in Nevada thought we should lose. When we buckle down defensively and play the right way we are a tough team to beat.”
Whether the Lakers will be the same team when they return to the floor Thursday night after the NBA trade deadline remains uncertain as rumors continue to swirl around the In-season Tournament champions.
SOCCER Messi expected to play today in Japan
Look for Lionel Messi to play on today in Tokyo where Inter Miami meets Japanese club Vissel Kobe in a friendly.
And don’t look for another public relations disaster as happened on Sunday when Argentina’s World Cup-winning captain sat on the bench for an entire match against a selection of players from the Hong Kong league, angering thousands of fans who demanded refunds.
Teammate Luis Suarez — another big name at Miami — also remained on the bench.
Messi, who has been nursing a groin injury, showed up at a five-star Tokyo hotel on Tuesday for his second news conference since joining Miami last June 7, and his first since Aug. 17. He sat alone on a stool on stage, wore a pink warm-up jacket, and showed a bit of humility.
“The truth is that I feel very good compared to a few days ago,” Messi said in Spanish. “And depending on how that (training) goes. And if I’m honest, I still don’t know if I will be able to or not. But I feel much better and I really want to be able to do it.”
Messi trained later Tuesday in suburban Tokyo and looked fit, running drills and moving with ease at a practice facility run by the Japan Football Association. He did not speak afterward with reporters.
“Unfortunately, in football, things can happen in any game, that we may have an injury,” he said earlier. “It’s a shame because I always want to participate, I want to be there, and even more so when it comes to these games when we travel so far and people are so excited to see our matches.”
Inter Miami’s global tour has been disappointing as the club tries to build a brand using its veteran stars Messi and Suarez. In five games from El Salvador, to Dallas, to Saudi Arabia and Hong Kong, Inter Miami has won only once and been outscored 12-7.
NFL Raiders hire Getsy as offensive coordinator
The Las Vegas Raiders hired former Chicago Bears offensive coordinator Luke Getsy on Tuesday, going to their second option after Kliff Kingsbury withdrew from consideration Saturday.
New Raiders coach Antonio Pierce will be looking for Getsy to help turn around an offense that this past season was 27th in yards per game (289.5) and 23rd in scoring (19.5-point average).
But Getsy, 39, was fired by the Bears after Chicago tied for 18th with 21.2 points per game, just five spots ahead of Las Vegas.
Getsy, however, might have been hindered by the lack of development of third-year quarterback Justin Fields as a passer. Fields completed 61.4% of his passes this season with a quarterback rating of 86.3.
He did oversee a Bears rushing attack that was second in rushing yards (2,399) and rushing yards per game (141.1).
Now Getsy has to prove the Raiders got it right. Las Vegas had agreed in principle with Kingsbury on Thursday, but they failed to come to terms.