LA Clippers: What other series mean for team’s chances
By Evan Desai
The LA Clippers are off to a poor start in their first round series with the Mavericks, but they’re still alive.
The LA Clippers are down 0-2, and are the only team in the Western Conference not in an even series.
Every other series is tied up at 1-1. All three Western Conference series do play a role in how deep the Clippers make it should they come back and win this series vs. the Mavericks. Two of these three series have clear-cut preferable matchups for the Clippers, but the first could be viewed as a toss-up.
Phoenix Suns-LA Lakers: What first two games mean for the LA Clippers
In the Phoenix Suns-LA Lakers series, the Suns won Game 1 in Phoenix 90-99. Devin Booker and DeAndre Ayton were unstoppable. Booker scored 34 points on 13 of 26 shooting (3 of 7 from three) with 8 assists and 7 rebounds. Ayton was 10 of 11 with 21 points and 16 rebounds.
It was a really impressive win for Phoenix, especially considering that Chris Paul got a little banged up in the contest. He came back, but didn’t quite look like himself, scoring seven points and eight assists.
In Game 2, Paul’s injury seemed to really be affecting him. He played just 23 minutes and scored just six points, dropped five dimes, only attempted five shots (made two) and didn’t attempt a single three pointer.
The Suns looked dangerous in Game 1, but with CP3 injured, the team may look more like the squad that showed up in Game 2 for the rest of the playoffs.
The Lakers lacked a certain level of chemistry coming into that series due to the injuries they faced during the year. It had major effects on them in Game 1. Heck, LeBron James and Anthony Davis didn’t even put up 20 points.
Anthony Davis was outplayed by Ayton, and everybody was outplayed by Booker. The Clippers could look at this series in multiple different ways.
They could want the Lakers due to them only winning 42 games this year and showing that they have cohesiveness issues coming into the playoffs (which is a bad problem to have), or they could want the Suns, who didn’t look like the dangerous team they looked like in Game 1 due to Paul’s shoulder injury.
Either way, both teams have questions. If the Clippers can get themselves together to go on a deep run and maybe play one of these teams in the Western Conference Finals, they could potentially be matching up against a team that isn’t playing their best basketball.
Sure, it’s an accomplishment to get to the Conference Finals in itself, but the Suns need Paul at full strength if they want to go all the way and win an NBA Championship. The Lakers need to play cohesive basketball if they want to win their chip.