How LA Clippers can avoid a Lakers-type collapse against OKC Thunder

The Lakers suffered their worst loss of the season against the Oklahoma City Thunder, who the LA Clippers play on Monday.

The Lakers blew a 26-point lead to choke their game against them on Wednesday night, and even saw Russell Westbrook get ejected.

The Clippers haven’t been as good as they would have hoped this season as well, however, and they need to make sure the Thunder don’t steal another game against an LA franchise.

The LA Clippers can prevent a Lakers-type collapse against OKC by shooting the way they’re capable of from three.

The Lakers shot just 31.4% from three in their collapse against the Thunder, who shot 40.5% from three. It wasn’t long ago when the LA Clippers used to shoot teams out of the building like the Thunder just did the Lakers.

The Clippers last year were the best shooting team in the NBA, and led the league in three-point percentage (41.1%), but have been struggling this year. They’re shooting just 30.7% from deep this season, which is the fifth-worst percentage in basketball.

The Lakers shot even better than that against the Thunder and still lost.

The Clippers need to start shooting the way they were supposed to again. It’s necessary in this conference.

We didn’t play well on Wednesday either, taking the loss to the Cleveland Cavaliers. We shot an abysmal 22% in that game from three. We went cold, and we’ve only shot 35% or higher from three once this season.

Last year, we had nine three-point shooters over 40% from deep. This year, we have just two (Jay Scrubb and Luke Kennard).

The Clips could potentially lose this game, even at home, if they can’t get it together from back behind the arc.

One of the bright spots for this slow Clippers’ start is that the team who was projected to win the West by most analysts in the Lakers has at least not gotten off to a hot start either. If the Clips lose to the Thunder, however, there will be no moral victories to try to come up with.