With or without coach Tyronn Lue patrolling the sideline, the Clippers will play yet another meaningful game against another tough Western Conference foe in the Memphis Grizzlies on Friday night at the Intuit Dome.
They are now the seventh seed in the West, which would put them in the play-in tournament. But they are only 3½ games behind the fifth-seeded Grizzlies and entered Thursday one game behind the sixth-seeded Golden State Warriors. The Clippers (39-30) own the head-to-head tiebreaker over the Grizzlies (2-0) and Warriors (3-0).
The Clippers also play Oklahoma City at home on Sunday. The Thunder (57-12) have the best record in the NBA. The Clippers are looking to take a stand in these games, knowing how important each win is to their chances of inching up in the uber-tough West and securing a playoff spot.
“All three teams that we have this week are ahead of us as far as with better records, two of them in the Western Conference. They were statement games,” guard Norman Powell said. “You want to go out there and play and show that we can compete and beat these teams. This is playoff time. I think we have 12 games left. …
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“So it’s all about positioning and playing your best brand of basketball. Down the stretch of games and getting ready for the playoffs, it’s always good to have the top teams that have kind of solidified their one, two, three spots in the postseason, to go and see where we’re at and see where we can improve to go out there and be the team that we need to be going down this last stretch.”
Lue has missed four of the last six games because of back issues, the last against Cleveland on Tuesday night, and assistant Brian Shaw has been at the helm in his place. The Clippers say Lue’s status for the game against the Grizzlies is to be determined Friday.
Shaw, a former coach of the Denver Nuggets, has led the Clippers to a 3-1 record in Lue’s absence. And the wins and losses go on Lue’s ledger, Shaw reminded everyone, laughing.
Clippers assistant coach Jeff Van Gundy, who is in charge of the defense, missed the Cavaliers game because of a family matter. Neither he nor was at practice Thursday.
“As far as JV, we’re just praying for him and his family situation that he can get back to us as soon as possible,” Shaw said. “T. Lue is still experiencing some back issues, and so the same thing with him. We just want him to get back as soon as possible. We also want him to take care of himself for whatever it takes for him to be able to get back.”
The win over the Cavaliers with Shaw in charge was another significant game against the team that had the best record in the NBA, and it was the Clippers’ fourth win in a row and seventh in eight games.
They are sticking to the message that it is about what they do and not so much about trying to make a statement against the top teams.
“Yeah, it’s about our group,” Shaw said. “When we’re in a position to be able to control what comes next for us, we have to take control of those situations. That’s how I’ve been approaching it, we’ve been approaching it. Not trying to make it more than what it is.
“The one thing I really saw in the Cleveland game is like the joy that everybody was playing with. So, we want to continue that. We want them to have fun, we want them to compete and I think if we compete and we have fun, we share the ball and everybody feels like they are involved. … We got a lot of contributions in a lot of different ways. So, we just want everybody to star in their role.”
The Clippers have just enough time left to put themselves in the best possible position in the competitive and crowded West. And the talented Grizzlies are next in line for the Clippers.
“Memphis is going to do what they are going to do. They are going to try to impose their will on us. We have to try to do the same thing with them,” Shaw said. “But like I said, it’s just mainly execute what we want to execute and worry about playing the right way and doing the right things.”
This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.