Just short of the mark
Clippers give defending champion Warriors a real battle, but lose in matchup of Western powers.
OAKLAND — Doc Rivers was cheery about an hour before his team played its archrival. The Clippers coach jokingly told a tightly bunched scrum of reporters to make way so that he could reach his designated spot and say something controversial.
He would do nothing of the sort, praising the Golden State Warriors and saying he was being nice to the defending NBA champions because his wife had instructed him to do so.
“I listened for once,” Rivers said, laughing.
His mood would darken a bit after his team fought back from one double-digit deficit Wednesday night at Oracle Arena only to lose its own double-digit lead in the fourth quarter of a 112-108 loss to the Warriors.
Golden State’s Stephen Curry scored 13 of his 31 points in the fourth quarter to help his team come back from a 10-point deficit with just under eight minutes to play. He skipped down the court in glee after making a three-pointer with 68 seconds left to give the Warriors a 108-106 lead.
Chris Paul hoisted a threepointer with 19 seconds left that would have given the Clippers the lead, but it grazed off the front of the rim and the Warriors went on to survive as the only unbeaten team in the Western Conference. Paul did not play the final 13 seconds after sustaining a strained right groin that is not considered serious.
Rivers said the difference between the teams was their lategame execution, with the Warriors (5-0) getting Curry open for a corner jumper with 21⁄2 minutes left.
“To see Curry wide open in the
corner was disheartening for us,” Rivers said.
The Clippers (4-1) showed some resolve in the same building where Rivers had called them “soft” almost exactly one year ago, becoming the first team this season to take a lead over the Warriors heading into the fourth quarter. It wasn’t enough.
“It would be encouraging if we won,” Clippers shooting guard J.J. Redick said. “We’re not the Bad News Bears. We’re a team that has championship aspirations and for us to do that we have to win and we have to beat them.”
The Clippers took a 10-point cushion with 7:56 left on a Jamal Crawford tip-in, but Golden State forward Harrison Barnes scored the Warriors’ next 10 points to help them retake the lead. Curry then made two three-pointers, celebrating the second by raising both arms as the Warriors went ahead by four points.
Clippers forward Blake Griffin was strong all around with 23 points, 10 rebounds and six assists and DeAndre Jordan snagged 13 rebounds to become the franchise’s all-time leading rebounder, surpassing Elton Brand.
Since this was Warriors-Clippers, some chippy play was a prerequisite. There was a heated exchange midway through the fourth quarter that resulted in technical fouls on Draymond Green and Paul.
A funny thing happened after Paul picked up his fourth foul early in the third quarter and went to the bench with his team trailing by eight points: The Clippers somehow started to play better. They outscored the Warriors, 19-10, over the next eight minutes to take an 83-82 lead entering the fourth quarter on Crawford’s layup while falling down.
Doc Rivers before the game agreed with Klay Thompson’s recent assessment that the Warriors could win 70 games this season. The Clippers put up some resistance in the teams’ first meeting Wednesday. They will try again when the teams meet Nov. 19 at Staples Center.
‘We’re a team that has championship aspirations and for us to do that . . . we have to beat them.’ — J.J. Redick, Clippers shooting guard