Jordan, Clippers get last laugh in Dallas
- Updated: March 7, 2016
The visit to Dallas had a lot of predictable outcomes. DeAndre Jordan getting booed was one. Dirk Nowitzki scoring points was another. Chris Paul being a Point God might not have been one, but it probably should’ve been.
Coming off a poor home loss to Atlanta, the Clippers were out to get back to winning ways and they did so, putting all the off-season Dallas drama behind them to eventually cruise to a 109-90 win.
J.J. Redick opened proceedings as per usual, coming off a screen to hit a curling three which would signal the start to a hot shooting half for the sharp shooter. Aside from Redick, the Clippers offense failed to fire but fortunately, so did Dallas’ as the Mavs took a slender one point lead into the first break.
The Clippers bench also failed to find their range despite Crawford’s 10 first half points (on 4/11 shooting) and after DeAndre Jordan started 5/7 on his free throws, Rick Carlisle implemented the Hack-A-DeAndre strategy where Jordan make one of his next six in the half as the Dallas crowd laughed and jeered.
Despite this, the Clippers remained two points adrift at half time with Redick and Jordan combing for 32 of the Clippers 50 points.
The Clippers were 9-0 coming into this game when Redick had scored 15+ points in a half. Jordan had 12 rebounds to go along with his 16 points as no other Clipper has more than three rebounds in the half. Chris Paul only played 12 minutes in the opening half due to foul trouble and he came out determined to write those wrongs in the second half as he exploded in the third quarter.
First he did this:
https://amp.twimg.com/v/dce6a74a-9709-4d69-9609-74d75584c81f
Then he did this to beat the buzzer:
Those pretty plays were apart of an 18 point quarter from the #PointGod as the Clippers blew the game wide open on the back of Paul’s brilliance during a 22-7 run to close the third quarter. The Clippers haven’t lost back to back games since Blake Griffin went down on Christmas Day and that trend wasn’t about to stop in Dallas and after Paul drained another long ball to open the final quarter, the game was put to bed.
The Clippers lead ballooned to 30 points halfway through the last quarter as the bench threw some shots up however they would run out 109-90 winners.
The Clippers all-conquering back court starred once again with 49 points. 27 and seven assists for Paul while Redick finished with 22 points on 9-14 shooting. Jordan finished with 23 points and 20 rebounds along with a monster plus/minus of +33 against his “former” team as it was Jordan who left Dallas with the last laugh.
The Clippers now head to Oklahoma City, hoping to take a 2-1 lead in the season series with the Thunder. A win for the Clippers will tie the teams up in the loss column as the race for third seed hots up!
Stay with us at Calisportsnews.com as we will keep you up-to-date on all things Los Angeles Clippers and the rest of the LA sports teams! All Cali, All the time!