3. The Clippers found a way when the three wasn’t falling
The year is 2018 so naturally, teams become three-happy regardless of whether the shot is falling or not on any given night.
Impressively, the Clippers didn’t give into that on Sunday night.
While they struggled from beyond the arc, shooting a dismal 5-25 (their least amount of three-point attempts in a game this season), the Clippers found an avenue to the basket through a number of quality interior passes with Danilo Gallinari, Montrezl Harrell and Gilgeous-Alexander all contributing heavily in that area.
Dime. pic.twitter.com/FunIHaXfkr
— LA Clippers (@LAClippers) October 22, 2018
Despite being -30 from the three-point line for the night, the Clippers made up for it, hitting 100% of their free throws (26-26) to win that battle by 15 points while finishing +14 on the boards, including reeling in six more offensive rebounds than the Rockets (Thanks, Montrezl) to help in the win.
This may need to become a common trend for the Clippers given they rank 27th in the league for 3-point percentage (30.4%) and 25th for 3-point attempts (26.3) and don’t have too many shooters, Lou Williams aside, capable of lighting it up from deep on any given night.
Gallinari, Tobias Harris along with the aforementioned guards are capable of knocking it down, however, they are far from the elite category in terms of team 3-point shooting across the league.