It seemed as though the Cleveland Cavaliers were almost certainly leaving LA with a huge win against the Los Angeles Clippers right up until the beginning of the second half. However, Paul George wasn’t going to let the Clippers suffer their 29th loss of the season tonight [per NBA.com]. Putting the team on his back and dropping 23 points in the final period, PG led the California side to erase the Cavaliers’ 26-point lead and clinch a 120-118 win. Right after the conclusion of the game, Russell Westbrook couldn’t help but hype up his star teammate for his endeavors.
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During the postgame interview, as Sports Illustrated’s Joey Linn reported, the sixth man claimed that he knew George was going to ‘have it going’, “when he woke up this morning”. Further lauding the two-way forward, the 2017 MVP said:
“When he’s playing at his best, not too many people can beat us.”
Paul George put up one of his best performances of the season at the Crypto.com Arena in front of a 19,000+ crowd. Per NBA.com, playing for a game-high 44:07 minutes, the 33-year-old lodged 39 points, 11 rebounds, 7 assists, and 2 ‘stocks’ [1 steal and 1 block]. Apart from cutting down the Cavaliers’ 26-point lead, the 6ft 8” sharpshooter also knocked down the game-winning shot despite Evan Mobley’s impressive contest.
Darius Garland, who recorded an incredible 28-point of his own [per NBA.com], couldn’t help but be amazed by George’s production. Of course, the Cleveland guard seemed to be dejected after his team blew a 26-point lead. But, he could do nothing other than tip his hat to the “future Hall-Of-Famer”, as seen in Tomer Azarly’s X[Formerly Twitter] post below.
“Tough. Hall-of-Famer. What can you say? He hit some tough shots. He hit a tough shot over Evan for the game. Just tip our hat off to him. He’s a Hall-of-Famer and just live with the results and try to make it as tough as we can,” Garland spoke about PG’s game-winner.
When he spoke to reporters, PG13 shared compliments to the Russell Westbrook-led second unit of the Clippers for contributing 31 points as per NBA.com (outscoring the Cavaliers’ bench by 16 points). As the nine-time All-Star rightly stated, the bench did have a huge say in staging the upset.
“They were great. Russ brought a ton of energy, which he always does. Mason [Plumlee] was good. Amir [Coffey], big three. Norm[an Powell] was aggressive, made timely shots… I can’t take credit for none of it without them,” Paul spoke about the bench.
Having won 6 out of the last 7 games, the Los Angeles Clippers have improved to a 50-28 record [per NBA.com]. Apart from regaining their 4th spot in the standings, the team has also managed to bridge the gap to the #3 Oklahoma City Thunder. However, with only four regular-season games remaining, clinching the 3rd seed seems to be next to impossible. Additionally, with the #5 Dallas Mavericks being 2 games behind them, the #4 seed virtually seems like a lock for the LAC.
