Harden wasn’t very good today but he kept his head and effort in the game to help the team play a quality Q4, especially in the last 5 minutes. I like the fact that he didn’t sulk or look disinterested. He kept trying to make plays.

Game really turned when Terance Mann re-entered the game down -1 at the 8 min mark and we proceeded to outscore the Mavs by +10 to the end of the game. During that run, we committed only 1 foul before the refs attempted to gift Luka a phantom foul on T-Mann late in Q4 with the Clips up +6 (ironically, I didn’t think there was a foul on Mann on the shot that Luka missed, but Luka followed up and got a bucket that was wiped out by that phantom foul call. Luka then missed the 2 FTs and that was pretty much the game. Refs kinda owned themselves). The key is that by playing solid defense, not over-doubling and playing defense without fouling, the Clips gave themselves a chance to let Dallas’ fatigue catch up to them and take advantage at the other end.

Mann restored defensive order, got a key bucket over Luka, a key assist on a backdoor pass to Kawhi for a dunk, and 2 rebounds. Amir Coffey played solid D in Q1 and Q4 and hit the huge 3 pt shot after a Kawhi wrap around pass from the baseline at the 3 min mark that gave us the lead for good.

Kawhi got into Terminator mode. His decision making on his drives to the paint was first rate: the baseline wrap around pass to Coffey for a 3, the late drive, hesitation dribble where he was almost behind the basket and pass to find Norm streaking to the basket down the middle for a layup, the cross over/euro step to split two defenders and get a layup, taking advantage of a 1 v1 matchup at the right baseline to go in for the dunk: it doesn’t get much better or more clutch than that.

I didn’t like leaving Zu off the floor in Q4. I think we got away with it because Mann and Coffey played good positional defense without fouling, Dallas forgot to hunt Norm, and they simply got tired and settled for long 3s while Luka also missed FTs. Having Amir Coffey’s size on the floor makes a small ball lineup a bit more credible, however.

In the big picture, we wore Luka down as he was 9/25 and only 2/11 from 3. He only scored 7 in the 2nd half. It’s another example of how our POA defense, led by Mann, but also assisted today by Coffey, Harden, Russ is able to corral the best scorers in the league.

Still, we probably should’ve lost this game. Dallas hustled with a playoff level of intensity and put us on the ropes. That said, teams that get these types of tough wins tend to grow and get better from the experience.