Kawhi-less Clippers can’t catch Spurs down the stretch

INGLEWOOD — There certainly have been more positive days for the Clippers this season, and far easier games to play. This was not one.

Not only did the Clippers have to play the talented San Antonio Spurs again, but they also had to face superstar Victor Wembanyama without their own star, Kawhi Leonard.

Leonard missed the game after suffering a sprained ankle against the Sacramento Kings on Saturday. The seven-time All-Star initially was ruled doubtful for Monday’s game, but he was downgraded three hours before tip-off. He sat on the bench and appeared to walk without a noticeable limp or discomfort and will join the team on its upcoming trip.

But that wasn’t the only uplifting thing about Monday night’s game.

Instead of wringing their hands and hanging their heads over the absence of their star forward, the Clippers put together a late stand before losing, 119-115, at the Intuit Dome.

“They really pressure your guards and try to speed you up,” Clippers coach Tyronn Lue said. “And then if they get beat, we know who’s sitting behind them.”

Wembanyama.

“It allows them to be more aggressive, get up the floor more, pressure more, and they did that,” Lue said. “… Tonight, that first half, even when we scored, they was getting out fast and we couldn’t get back and couldn’t recover.”

The Clippers trailed by 24 points late in the third quarter, but they never folded. Darius Garland found Bennedict Mathurin under the basket for a layup that pulled the hosts within 108-102 with 4:14 left in the game. That forced Wembanyama and Stephon Castle to come back into the game.

The Spurs ran off seven straight for a 115-102 lead, but the Clippers made one last surge. Garland scored seven of their next nine points, and they pulled within 115-111 on his 3-pointer with 38.7 seconds left. Devin Vassell’s two free throws, plus a blocked shot and two free throws from Wembanyama in the final 30 seconds iced the game for the Spurs (50-18), who reached 50 wins in a season for the first time since 2016-17.

The Clippers dropped their second consecutive game and are now back at .500 (34-34) as they jockey for the best possible position in the Play-In Tournament (seeds 7-10) with 14 games left in the regular season.

The game was eerily similar to the teams’ previous meeting, when the Clippers ran out to a 25-point lead in San Antonio only to see the Spurs take control of the game and lead by as much as 24 before the Clippers threatened late.

“Our defensive intensity just died,” Garland said of Monday’s loss. “The ball got stagnant. Turnovers.”

Garland had eight of the Clippers’ 13 turnovers.

Much like the earlier game, Wembanyama overcame a sluggish start to lead the Spurs to victory. He finished with 21 points, 13 rebounds and four blocks, while Stephon Castle had 23 points, seven rebounds and eight assists. Vasell added 20 points and four assists.

At times, the Clippers looked very much like a team that was playing its fifth game in eight days. They got beat on the boards 52-35 (the Spurs had 22 at the offensive end), gave up 25 second-chance points and had no answer for Wembanyama.

“In all seriousness, you really can’t attack the paint when he’s in there,” the Clippers’ Jordan Miller said.

Garland and John Collins, both of whom missed the March 6 game in Texas, were both in the starting lineup on Monday, but they couldn’t completely fill the void left by Leonard.

Garland scored a team-high 25 points to go with 10 assists. Miller added 22 points and nine rebounds off the bench, while Mathurin had 16 points as the Clippers’ reserves outscored the Spurs’ bench players 57-30.

“The young guys came in, Cam Christie, Kobe Sanders, they came in and Jordan being off the bench with Isaiah (Jackson) and I thought their energy was really good in that third quarter to come back and cut the lead and continue to keep fighting, playing the right way,” Lue said. “We got it close and then I think we gave up a three, missed a rotation, give up a three I think to Castle. But just coming in, competing, playing at a high level that’s what our young guys did tonight, we needed every bit of it.”

With a lineup that included Sanders, Christie and Jackson, the Clippers went on a 16-3 run late in the third quarter to get within 10.

And while the Clippers continued to score, pulling to within 98-91 on a layup by Jackson with 9:01 left in the game, they still struggled to slow the Spurs at the other end.

Lue said the Clippers needed to play better, especially on the defensive end, against the second-place team in the Western Conference.

“We got to have a different mindset than we had last game,” Lue said before tip-off, adding that the Clippers needed to have a defensive mindset. “I don’t think we were really good last game.”

The Clippers held a commanding early lead the last time they played the Spurs but couldn’t maintain their intensity as Wembanyama shook off fatigue from a tense game the night before and came away with a four-point victory in San Antonio.

This time, the Clippers again ran out to a double-digit lead (17-3) as the Spurs missed eight of their first nine shots, but the visitors trimmed the margin to 33-26 against the Clippers’ second unit. The Clippers held a 37-29 advantage at the end of the first quarter as Wembanyama struggled to find the basket, but things were about to shift.

Less than three minutes into the second quarter, the Clippers’ lead was gone. Lue put the starters back in, but they couldn’t slow the Spurs, who tied the game at 37-all on a 3-pointer by Jordan McLaughlin at the 9:51 mark.

The Spurs outscored the Clippers 37-15 in the second quarter and were in control with a 66-52 lead at the break after Wembanyama got rolling. He had 13 points and eight rebounds by the intermission.

“He (Wembanyama) changed the whole game,” Mathurin said. “He’s a great player, so offensively and defensively it’s kind of hard to contain him. He definitely changed the game for us for sure.”