INGLEWOOD — Game Seven.
Those truly are two of the most magical words in sports. Winner advances, or in the ultimate case celebrates with champagne. Loser goes home. No half measures here.
And just getting to that last-chance game probably means more when you’ve had to dig your way out of trouble to get there, as the Clippers have done over the last several days.
They are in Game 7, Saturday in Denver against the Nuggets, because they took care of business in Game 6 on their home court on Thursday night, winning 111-105.
James Harden made up for a deficient Game 5, in a 131-115 loss, with 28 points, six rebounds, eight assists, two steals, a blocked shot and 46:35 of effort and sweat. Kawhi Leonard (27 points, 10 rebounds) and Norman Powell (24 points, including a killer of a 3-pointer with 1:47 left for a 110-101 lead), came up big when it mattered most. Nicolas Batum seemed to be everywhere in his 34:22 of playing time, and Ivica Zubac made life hard on Denver’s three-time league MVP, Nikola Jokic.
“I thought James did a great job setting the tone early,” Clippers coach Ty Lue said. “Scoring the basketball, getting downhill, making the right play. Norm made some big shots at the end. And Kawhi was just kind of steady throughout the game. But I thought those three guys really stepped up, came to play.
“I thought Zu was a monster on the defensive end tonight. Getting closer to Joker, not giving him as much space. And I mean the Joker – it’s just hard. You know if you double-team him, he’s going to pick you apart with his passing. If you stay at home, he’s going to score.
“So I give our guys credit just staying with it, you know. Don’t get deflated. And we did a good job just keeping our head.”
Maybe it’s poetic justice that these Clippers are the last L.A. NBA team standing. (Calm down, Laker fans.)
This really is a likable team, a group seemingly undeterred by the foibles of this franchise’s past. Having a home of their own might have meant an attitude change as well, and rest assured that the announced 17,927 on Thursday night in the Intuit Dome, listed as a sellout, did their part.
(Although here’s some advice for Clippers fans and especially those who populate The Wall: Chanting “M-V-P” for Leonard is fine … unless he’s stepping up to the free-throw line with 18.8 seconds left in a five-point game. Leonard, an 81% free-throw shooter, made the first but missed the second. When in doubt, why not let the man concentrate?)
We could say Thursday’s result was karmic retribution for the ending of Game 4, that excruciating 101-99 loss in the last 10th-of-a-second when no one boxed out Aaron Gordon and he reached up to slam home Jokic’s errant shot just before time expired. But maybe that’s extending this magical theme a bit too far.
It’s probably immaterial to the subject at hand, but the Clippers are 4-4 in Game 7s in their playoff history. (Their ancestors, the Buffalo Braves, lost their only Game 7 in 1975).
But the two focal points of this team are 3-3 in Game 7s. Harden won series with Oklahoma City (2011 against Memphis) and Houston (2015 against the Clippers, 2020 against OKC) and lost as a Rocket (to Golden State in 2018), as a Brooklyn Net (to Milwaukee in 2021) and as a Philadelphia 76er (to Boston in 2023).
Leonard lost as a San Antonio Spur to Miami in the 2013 Finals, to the Clippers in 2015 and to Denver in the 2020 bubble, a team that had Jokic and Jamal Murray and Michael Porter Jr. on it, as this one does. His Spurs defeated Dallas in a first-round Game 7 in 2014, and his Toronto Raptors won a memorable seventh game against Philadelphia in the 2019 Eastern Conference semifinals on Leonard’s last-second shot from the baseline that bounced around the rim before finally going in, en route to an NBA title.
And as a Clipper, Leonard was part of a Game 7 victory over Dallas in 2021, which was the last time until now that he’d played a full playoff series.
He was asked what advice he would offer on this Game 7, and it turned out to be less about the magnitude of the game and more about its site.
“We been there before,” he said. “We played there, it’s going to be our fourth time. So just play like any other game, just go out there and have fun. Let’s stay locked in with each other and got to talk. And … they’re a good team at home. So we got to be able to come out in that first quarter.”
For Harden, forcing this Game 7 helped erase the memory of Tuesday night’s Game 5 in Denver, when he was 3 for 9 from the field and finished with 11 points in 35 minutes.
“Honestly, I didn’t see the criticism at all,” Harden said. “But internally I know what needs to be done. So I had multiple conversations with T-Lue, you know, and even after Game 5 he came up to me on the plane and was like, ‘You know, I need to get you more involved.’ Just because I got the ball in my hands, you know, it’s often seemed like I can just do anything. But, you know, we still got an offense to run. So tonight the game plan was more of me being in attack mode and making sure our spacing was right. And as a result, you know, I could, you know, be aggressive.”
Before Thursday night Harden was averaging 38.7 minutes played in this series, and in the four games that have been close his usage has been around 42.8 minutes.
He might be tired, but he’s ready for more. Asked if he had another 47 or 48 minutes left in him to close out this series, he said:
“Got to. Have to. … Whatever the team needs, 47, 48, overtime, whatever, we’re gonna do it.”
jalexander@scng.com
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