The Clippers had a chance to take control of their series with the Mavericks in Wednesday night’s Game 5 in Los Angeles, but instead they stunk up the joint in the second half and got blown out, 123-93, to fall behind 3-2 as the series shifts to Dallas for Friday night’s Game 6.
The Clippers were without Kawhi Leonard in Game 5, as he continues to deal with an injury to his right knee. Los Angeles had won the other two games in the series that Leonard had missed, which makes Wednesday night’s performance even harder for fans to understand.
Paul Pierce didn’t hold back on the Clippers on FS1’s Unidisputed, calling them a moody team.
The Clippers, who won Game 4 in Dallas without Leonard, will need to turn things completely around in Game 6 or their season could come to an abrupt end.
Early in the fourth quarter it looked like Boston was going to cruise to a 3â0 series lead. A Derrick White three staked the Celtics to a 21-point lead with 11 minutes to play. The three-point line was hot and the Mavericks looked finished. Then P.J. Washington hit a three. Then Luka Doncic hit a layup. Then Dereck Lively II tipped in a miss. A 12â0 run cut the lead to nine with eight minutes to play. A 20â2 run made it a one-possession game with six minutes to play.
Doncic was hot. Kyrie Irving was rolling. Dallas had life.
With 4:38 to play, Doncic picked up his fifth personal foul. Bad. Fewer than 30 seconds later, he picked up his sixth. Worse. Dallas, faced with trying to complete the comeback with its All-NBA guard on the bench, crumbled. An Irving jumper briefly cut the lead to one but Boston quickly pushed it back up to three, then six, then eight. And that was your ball game.
âWe had a good chance,â Doncic said. âWe were close. Just didnât get it. I wish I was out there.â
Said Jayson Tatum, âThe game of basketball is about runs, and this is at the highest level. You know, itâs the best team in the West at this point. They are going to make shots. They are going to go on a run, and itâs just all about how do you respond.â
When Dallas surged to an early 13-point first-quarter lead, there was Tatum, scoring 20 of his 31 points in the first half to keep the game close. When Boston needed buckets down the stretch, there was Jaylen Brown, who scored 24 of his 30 in the second half, including nine in the fourth quarter.
It wasnât a flawless game. Tatum struggled with his shot, finishing 11-for-26. Brown was 2-for-9 from three-point range. But they refused to get discouraged. It was Tatumâs driving dunk in traffic that pushed the Celticsâ lead to six late in the fourth quarter. It was Brownâs 21-footer that put the game away. For just the second time in Celtics history, two players scored at least 30 points in a Finals game. And when the final buzzer sounded, the two stars embraced near center court.
âJust you know showing the emotions of the game,â Tatum said. âTwo guys that were excited, tired, that, you know, after the game. Weâre not necessarily saying like, âOne more,â or anything like that. We are just saying, âHowever long it takes.â Nobody is relaxed. Nobody is satisfied. Just at that moment, you know, just told him I was proud of him and he said the same thing. That weâve got to keep fighting. We canât relax.â
Role players have become the story of this series. For Boston, the first two games were dominated by Kristaps Porzingis, who returned from a 38-day absence to help power Boston to a 2â0 series lead. In Game 3, with Porzinigis out, it was White (16 points) and Sam Hauser (nine) making shots. Al Horford stretching out for 37 minutes. Xavier Tillman, playing his first minutes of this series, finishing a +9 in 11 minutes.
âI just think that top to bottom, we trust everybody, and we just compete at a high level,â White said. âObviously, they are great players, and itâs a challenge but [itâs] just consistently being in the right position and just competing.â
Tillman came up big in Game 3, playing his first minutes of the Finals. / Peter Casey-USA TODAY Sports
On Dallasâs side, it was more of the same. Washington chipped in nine points during Dallasâs fourth-quarter comeback but finished with 12 overall. Derrick Jones Jr. was a non-factor. Maxi Kleber, too. Jason Kidd dusted off Tim Hardaway Jr. for 20 minutes. Hardaway finished 0-for-5. In the first half, Kiddâs rotation went 11 deep.
âWe were trying to find someone to come off the bench and give us a spark,â Kidd said. âIt doesnât always have to be someone making a shot. I thought the guys that played tonight helped us get the lead or get back into the game.
âWhen you look at some of the guys who played, we got good looks, some of them made them, some of them didnât. I thought the group that played, once that third quarter got away from us, it just showed the group kept playing.â
In the conference playoffs, Luke Kornet gobbled up the bulk of the non-Porzingis minutes. In Game 3, Celtics coach Joe Mazzulla went with Tillman, in part because of the ex-Memphis Grizzlies forwardâs experience against the Mavericks. Tillman responded by knocking down a corner three in the third quarter and swatting away two shots.
âBig shout out to X,â White said. âTo not be in the rotation but to stay locked in and he gives us big-time minutes. He just does a little bit of everything out there. Then he guarded his ass off and hit a big shot and rebounds, and he just did a little bit of everything for us. Credit to him. Great, great teammate, great guy, and he was big for us.â
The statistics say no. Of the 156 teams that have trailed 3â0 in an NBA playoff series, zero have come back to win it. The more pressing concern is if Dallas can avoid a sweep. Doncic struck an optimistic tone at his postgame news conference. âBeing down 21 in the third game and then coming back was a really positive thing for us,â he said. And the Mavs did get a breakout game from Irving (35 points). But as talented as Doncic and Irving are, they are not getting enough help. And a Celtics team that nearly completed a 3â0 comeback last season isnât sounding like one ready to let this one slip away.
âYou have to expect the expected,â Mazzulla said. âYouâve got to understand we are just as vulnerable if not more vulnerable than they are. And we have to play that way. So as long as we have that mindset, and when you understand that youâre vulnerable and your backâs against the wall, youâve got to fight. And so thatâs the mindset that we have to have.â
Last week, as thousands of green-clad fans spilled out of TD Garden and onto nearby Causeway St. still buzzingâand for many, still buzzedâfrom Bostonâs Game 2 win over Indiana, an unmistakable chant filled the warm spring air.
We want Kyrie âŚ
We want Kyrie âŚ
It will be Dallas vs. Boston in the NBA Finals. Itâs also Boston vs. Kyrie. Five years after Kyrie Irvingâs abrupt exit, public (basketball) enemy No. 1 is back in town. They have met in the playoffs before, with Irvingâs Nets wiping the floor with a battered Boston team in 2021 and the Celtics sweeping Brooklyn in â22.
A trip to the second round was at stake in those series.
Said Irving, âBoston is in the way between our goal.â
In Boston, the disdain for Irving runs deep. Heâs Ulf Samuelsson in high tops. Roger Goodell in gym shorts. The most disliked NBA player since Bill Laimbeer. What Reggie Miller is to New York, Irving is to Boston. The only difference is Miller never wore a Knicks uniform. On eBay, you can still buy Irving jerseys in Celtics green.
Time heals most wounds. Not these. These have barely scabbed over. Irving has not exactly attempted to ease the tension. In 2021, before Irving returned to Boston for a first-round playoff series with Brooklyn, he said he hoped not to hear any âsubtle racism.â After beating the Celtics in Game 4, Irving walked to center court and stomped on the logo.
There will inevitably be attempts to rewrite history in the days ahead. Irving didnât hate Boston. He just wanted to go home to New York. He didnât have bad relationships with his teammates. Thatâs media stuff, reporters chasing clicks. He didnât bail out on his team late in the 2018-19 season. Those Celtics just didnât have enough.
Nonsense. He wasnât on the same page as Brad Stevens. He didnât have much of a relationship with Jaylen Brown. Quit is probably too strong of a word but talk to enough people around that 2018-19 team and itâs clear thereâs a belief that late in the season, Irving checked out. In the fall of â18, Irving grabbed a mic and told a giddy Garden crowd he intended to re-sign there. By the spring, he was gone.
On Sunday, Irving talked about how he better understands leadership. In Boston, he struggled with it. Irving was the only member of the Celtics core with a championship, a status he was known to wield like a cudgel. He knew what it took to winâand he had the ring to prove it. During one locker room discussion, sources told SI, it was pointed out that Al Horford won two championships at Florida. Not the same, Irving said. A Boston assistant was part of a championship staff in Europe. Not the same, he replied. Aron Baynes, a reserve center on the Celtics 2018-19 team who won a title with San Antonio, wasnât in the room for the exchange. At least one ex-teammate wonders what Irving would have said if he was.
Things never fully clicked for Irving (11) in Boston. / Jeremy Brevard-USA TODAY Sports
In Dallas, things are different. Throughout the organization, respect for Irving runs deep. He has been an extension of Jason Kidd on the floor. He has been a calming influence off of it. He has figured out how to succeed opposite Luka DonÄiÄ, creating an all-time great duo in the process. When Irving returned from a leg injury in January, team officials marveled at the effort Irving was putting in on the defensive end of the floor.
Asked about the skepticism of Irvingâs fit in Dallas, Kidd said, âItâs alright to be wrong.â
Some of it is Irving, at 32, facing reality. He has played on three teams in the last six seasons. Four in the last eight. Cleveland, Boston, BrooklynâVesuvius left less wreckage. When Irving hit free agency last summer, Dallas was the only team offering real money to sign him.
Some of it is Dallas. The warm Texas climate and its right leaning politics. âHe still will have his opinions of what he thinks,â said Kidd. âAnd here with the Mavs, we support that.â In Kidd, Irving has found a peer. Irving grew up watching Kidd in New Jersey. When Irving was in high school, they connected at a Nike event. âHe was pretty good,â said Kidd. Inside the Dallas locker room, the bond between Irving and Kidd is ironclad.
âJust being able to talk the truth or speak the truth to one another,â said Kidd. âI compliment him for trusting me. I'm only here to tell him the truth and to try to help him achieve his goals.â
Kidd knows what itâs like to be a villain in Boston, his Nets years filled with fierce Celtics battles. Kidd was fueled by the hate. At times, Irving has seemed rattled by it. Irving has faced the Celtics 10 times since the 2021 playoffs. He has lost each one. He has had several dustups with fans, admitting in â22 that the crass attacks were âabout so much you can take as a competitor.â It was bad then. It will be worse now.
âIâm at a place in my life where I donât consider those past moments,â Irving told ESPN. âI was able to unpack them in a healthy way [and] move forward as a person. I had a rough time there when I was in Boston, dealing with a death in my family and a lot of off-court stuff that I wasnât ready to handle. Now that Iâm in a great place to be able to vocalize how Iâm feeling, Iâm ready to go back into Boston and have fun with my teammates.â
Fun? Thatâs up to Irving. Dallas needs a poised Irving. A composed one. This will be a difficult series. The Celtics are 2â0 against the Mavericks this season. They beat them by nine before the trades that brought P.J. Washington and Daniel Gafford to Dallas. They beat them by 28 after. They have elite defenders, dynamic wing scorers and will likely have a healthy Kristaps PorziĹÄŁis when the series begins next week.
âThey have a lot of talented players,â said Kidd. âThey've been [to the Finals] before. They have the experience, they're well coached. This is another great test.â
They need Irving. DonÄiÄ will get his points. The All-NBA guard is enjoying one of the finest stretches of his career. But he will need help. He will need Irving to be the shot maker he was in the conference finals, where he averaged 27 pointsâincluding 36 in Game 5âon 49% shooting. The three-point shooter (42.3%) he has been in the playoffs. The All-Star-level sidekick he has been all season.
Irving is coming to Boston, and make no mistake: a hyped up Boston crowd will be waiting. The boos will be loud, the rhetoric nasty. It will be the most intense environment Irving has played in and this time, everything is at stake. A championship is within reach for Kyrie Irving. Itâs the Celtics, itâs Boston standing in front of it.
When Dallas Mavericks guard Luka Doncic walks on to a basketball court, he immediately becomes a threat to put up a triple-double.
In six years in the NBA, Doncic has been nothing short of a triple-double machine. He is already tied for eighth all-time in that category with 77â18 more than Hall of Fame forward Larry Bird, and 49 more than Hall of Fame guard Michael Jordan.
As he makes his NBA Finals debut, it's worth looking back at the history of players reaching double figures in three of basketball's five major counting statistics (points, rebounds, assists, steals and blocks) on the sport's biggest stage.
A triple-double, in basketball, is when a player hits three of the following statistical benchmarks in a single game: 10 points, 10 rebounds, 10 assists, 10 blocks or 10 steals. Hitting two is a more common double-double, while hitting four is an extraordinarily rare quadruple-double.
The NBA record for most career triple-doubles is held by Los Angeles Clippers guard Russell Westbrook with 199.
Since the advent of the NBA Finals, 23 players are known to have accomplished the feat, per StatMuse.
PLAYER
NUMBER OF TRIPLE-DOUBLES
LeBron James, Heat/Cavaliers/Lakers
11
Magic Johnson, Lakers
8
Draymond Green, Warriors
3
Larry Bird, Celtics
2
Jimmy Butler, Heat
2
Wilt Chamberlain, 76ers
2
Bob Cousy, Celtics
2
Walt Frazier, Knicks
2
NIkola JokiÄ, Nuggets
2
Bill Russell, Celtics
2
Charles Barkley, Suns
1
Elgin Baylor, Lakers
1
Dave Cowens, Celtics
1
Stephen Curry, Warriors
1
Tim Duncan, Spurs
1
Kevin Durant, Warriors
1
Jason Kidd, Nets
1
Jamal Murray, Nuggets
1
Scottie Pippen, Bulls
1
Rajon Rondo, Celtics
1
Wes Unseld, Bullets
1
Jerry West, Lakers
1
James Worthy, Lakers
1
Los Angeles Lakers forward LeBron James, with 11. James is the only player to accomplish the feat with three different teams, having registered triple-doubles with the Miami Heat, Cleveland Cavaliers and Lakers. He is also one of three players, along with ex-Los Angeles guard Jerry West and forward James Worthy, to record a triple-double in Game 7 of the Finals.
James spread his triple-doubles out, too: he recorded one in his much-maligned 2011 Finals, one in the 2012 Finals, two in the 2013 Finals, two in the 2015 Finals, one in Game 7 of the 2016 Finals, two in the 2017 Finals, one in the 2018 Finals, and one in the 2020 Finals.
