NEW ORLEANS – The Los Angeles Clippers led by 18 points in the first quarter and looked like a team ready to shake off their slump on Wednesday night, but then everything fell apart, falling to the New Orleans Pelicans 124-109 at Smoothie King Center, extending their losing streak to three and dropping their season record to 34-35.
For a team fighting for survival in the Western Conference playoffs, this collapse should concern the entire locker room.
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Kawhi Leonard, who returned to the starting lineup after missing Monday’s loss to the Spurs with a sprained left ankle, showed aggression, using his sharp shooting and physicality on both ends to help the Clippers lead 27-18.
He finished with 25 points and eight rebounds on 4-of-6 three-point shooting, but even with Leonard playing well, the Clippers couldn’t maintain the lead that once seemed entirely comfortable.
The new starting five of Darius Garland, Leonard, Derrick Jones Jr., John Collins and Brook Lopez helped Los Angeles lead 40-26 after one quarter, giving the early impression that a bounce-back game was coming. That feeling didn’t last long.
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New Orleans slowly fought back in the second quarter, tying the score at 58 before halftime, then outscored the Clippers 36-25 in the third quarter.
Saddiq Bey was the biggest problem all night, scoring 25 points on 5-of-10 three-point shooting, while Trey Murphy III joined him with 23 points and seven rebounds.
Dejounte Murray dished out 10 assists and Herbert Jones wreaked havoc on the other end with five steals.
A 16-4 fourth-quarter run sealed the win for the Pelicans, who are just 24-46 on the year but have been playing some of their best basketball of late, winning six of their past eight games.
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Not long ago, the Clippers were 7-1, but then lost to Sacramento, San Antonio, and now New Orleans, undoing the progress they had made over the past few weeks.
Two of those losses came at home, and now they open the road with a huge lead falling to one of the worst teams in the West.
The Clippers, currently 34-35 and eighth in the league, are on the verge of the playoffs and don’t have the luxury of a night like this.
They were 4-11 without Leonard this season, so the fact that they still lost by 15 points to a rebuilding team when he returned makes that even harder to explain.
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Garland, who arrived from Cleveland at the trade deadline, remains comfortable, contributing 19.9 points and 6.6 assists in seven games with the Clippers so far.
Collins finished with 18 points and seven rebounds, but when New Orleans started attacking in the second half, no one on the roster had an answer.
The Clippers will face the Pelicans again Thursday night before traveling to Dallas and will need to turn things around quickly as the margin for error is essentially gone at this point in the season.