This season has already been quite hard on many people, and the restart doesn’t seem to be easy due to the fact that it’s in a bubble.
Against the Washington Wizards, the Clippers had only 10 guys out in the court. Since Lou Williams, Ivica Zubac, Patrick Beverly, Landry Shamet, and Montrezl Harrell were all unavailable, the Clippers were counting in on their third-stringers to run the game –and man did they impress.
Seven of the Clippers managed to reach double-digit scores, being led by Patrick Patterson with 16 points, and they got a great 105 to 100 victory. The fans certainly caught the scores on the NBA lines.
People were certainly impressed to see all the reserves also hit at least 13 points, other than Joakim Noah. However, the big man Joakim Noah supported the team really well with six rebounds, five assists, one steal, one point, and five overall blocked shots. It’s safe to say all of them did incredibly well.
Fortunately for the team, they are expecting five of their members to be back quite soon. Shamet, Williams, and Zubac arrived on Saturday, while Beverley and Harrell are not too far behind.
However, Shamet and Zubac will have to go under a two-day quarantine period before they can get out of their rooms and join the rest of the team. On the other hand, Beverley and Harrell are regularly being tested for the virus, and they will have to stay quarantined for four days before they can join the team.
Lou Williams is a whole other case. During his team-excused absence, Williams admitted that he went to an Atlanta staple for dinner. That means Williams will be subjected to a 10-day quarantine period. That will lead to him missing out on the first two games of the restart, including the very important one against the Los Angeles Lakers that will be on the 30th of July.
Despite how well their scrimmage went, the Clippers have a big problem that they have to deal with. Even though the games are hard to play, being shorthanded and all, the coach admits that the practice is much harder without having five key rotation players there with the rest for the team.
When the seeding games finally begin, the LA Clippers will undoubtedly have a 1.5 game lead advantage on the Denver Nuggets. They will also have a 3 game lead on the Utah Jazz.
Seeding games will matter only towards the playoff matchups, and the LA Clippers feel quite confident about playing against every other team in the Western Conference.
Everyone is aware of the fact that the Clippers did all they could to keep their guys in tip-top shape, but it’s hard to replicate game action. Even though the players might be in shape now, the first one or two games will really help them get to where they were before the season paused.