Adjust your plans accordingly. There are just five game dates left in the NBA regular season.
For the LA Clippers, who sit 50-28 and fourth in the Western Conference, just four games remain. A home-and-home with the Phoenix Suns begins Tuesday night in Arizona before the Suns come to Los Angeles on Wednesday night in what will be the Clippers’ fifth game in seven days. The Clippers will play their last prime-time home game Friday against a cooked Utah Jazz team, and then they will finish the season at 12:30 p.m. (PT) Sunday against the eliminated Houston Rockets at home.
Kawhi Leonard will miss his fifth straight game due to right knee inflammation, and while the Clippers remain unconcerned about his status overall, team sources maintain that they will not rush him back.
James Harden will play Tuesday night, but the Clippers downgraded him to questionable before Sunday afternoon’s comeback win against the Cleveland Cavaliers, a game in which Harden did not play in the fourth quarter. Russell Westbrook could start at least one of the final games in Harden’s place when the Clippers can reach a clinching status.
Paul George has already said that he hopes the Clippers clinch their playoff spot before Sunday’s season finale, saying “I don’t need to be in that one.”
Here is what to watch for as the final week of the season gets underway.
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Chances of being in top three?
After the first weekend following the All-Star break, I posted that the Clippers would need at least 19 more wins to have a chance to be the No. 3-seeded team or better. The Clippers can’t reach that mark now.
The most wins the Clippers can get to is 54. The Minnesota Timberwolves and Denver Nuggets both have 54-24 records and meet each other in Denver on the second night of a back-to-back Wednesday. Even if the Timberwolves (hosting the woebegone Washington Wizards) and Nuggets (visiting Utah, losers of 12 straight games) both somehow lose Tuesday night, one of them will win Wednesday to mathematically eliminate the Clippers from the top seed.
Now, because the Clippers beat the Nuggets last week, they gave themselves a chance to still tie Denver in the standings. The Clippers lost the tiebreaker to the Timberwolves 3-1 this regular season (the 22-point blown lead hurts here), so they can’t catch the Timberwolves. For the Clippers to be the No.2-seeded team, the next three things would have to happen:
If the Clippers, Nuggets and Thunder were all 54-28 at the end of the season, then the Timberwolves would be No. 1 and the Clippers would be No. 2 on the strength of being the Pacific Division winner. The Clippers and Nuggets tying at 54-28 while the Thunder lose each of their last four games would favor the Clippers on the same division title tiebreaker.
The Clippers lost the regular-season tiebreaker to the Oklahoma City Thunder 2-1. The Clippers could be No. 3 if they win their last four games and one of these two things happen:
- The Thunder win at least two games and the Nuggets lose the last four games.
OR - The Nuggets win at least one game and the Thunder lose their last four games.
Again, the chances of all of these things happening are quite unrealistic, especially with Jamal Murray back for the Nuggets after being out for 15 days due to right knee inflammation and All-Star Shai Gilgeous-Alexander returning to the Thunder after being out for eight days due to a quad injury.
Clippers likely missing Play-In Tournament
Since Feb. 25, the Clippers have been fourth in the West every night except one, when they briefly slipped to No. 5 on March 25. Since then, the Clippers are 6-1 and the New Orleans Pelicans are 2-5.
The Sacramento Kings (45-33), Los Angeles Lakers (45-34) and Golden State Warriors (43-35) will at least be in the Play-In Tournament, but they cannot pass the Clippers in the standings. The only way the Suns and Pelicans (both 46-32) can pass the Clippers is if they win out and the Clippers lose out.
If that all happens, then the Clippers would lose the Pacific Division to the Suns based on Phoenix having a better division record (would be 10-8, with Phoenix getting two extra division games based on the In-Season Tournament giving the Suns a fifth contest against the Lakers and the Kings), while the Pelicans have the head-to-head tiebreaker over the Clippers after winning three of four regular-season matchups. The Suns have the two Clippers games, followed by visits to Sacramento and Minnesota to end the season. The Pelicans continue a West Coast road trip to Portland, Sacramento and Golden State before returning home for the season finale against the Lakers.
The only way for the Clippers to be the seventh seed in the Play-In Tournament goes as follows:
- The Clippers would have to lose the last four games.
- The 48-30 Dallas Mavericks (lost tiebreaker 2-1 to Clippers this season) would have to win at least two of the last four games (Charlotte Hornets, Miami Heat, Detroit Pistons, Oklahoma City).
- The Suns and Pelicans would both have to win the last four games.
- If all four of the Clippers, Pelicans, Suns and Mavericks finish with a 50-32 record, then the Suns and Mavericks would win their respective divisions and the Clippers would lose the tiebreaker to the Pelicans, dropping the Clippers into the Play-In Tournament.
Clippers clinching
For the Clippers to stay out of the Play-In Tournament and clinch a playoff spot, they need to win one game, or they need the Suns or Pelicans to lose a game, or they need the Mavericks to lose three games. The Clippers have two chances to take care of the Suns with the home-and-home starting Tuesday in Phoenix.
The Clippers have only two division titles in franchise history (2013 and 2014), and while that is not anyone’s ultimate goal, it is still a relevant achievement when it comes to these standings. The Clippers winning the Pacific Division also would make them the fifth team to win the division in the last six NBA seasons, making it the only division that has all five teams winning one in that span.
For the Clippers to clinch the fourth seed, they need a combination of two wins or Mavericks losses since the Clippers have the head-to-head tiebreaker. Back-to-back wins against the Suns could do it, though the Clippers haven’t won the fifth game in a five-in-seven game stretch since New Year’s Day 2022 in Brooklyn (ironically, a game that Kevin Durant and James Harden played). It took until the final day of the regular season in Phoenix last season for the Clippers to clinch a playoff spot, so they are ahead of that pace this season.
Who Clippers could play in first round
Because the possibility exists that the Clippers could be in the Play-In Tournament or mathematically could be a top-three seed, the Clippers could play any of the other nine teams still alive in the West.
The possibility exists that the Clippers could be getting a playoff preview of the Suns, a team they have already beaten decisively twice in January. The Pelicans are playing the worst recent stretch of basketball of any of the top 10 teams in the Western Conference, having lost six of the last 10 games. Every other team in the West has won at least half of their last 10 games. The Pelicans have dominated the Clippers as of late, while the Suns have three star scorers.
The Clippers are likely headed for a collision course with the Mavericks since it is doubtful that the Suns or Pelicans will pass either with one week to play. The Mavericks hold tiebreakers over both Phoenix and New Orleans. Dallas has a powerful offensive fulcrum in Luka Dončić, his best scoring teammate in Kyrie Irving and improved frontcourt talent in trade acquisitions power forward P.J. Washington and center Daniel Gafford (at least compared to outgoing offseason acquisitions Grant Williams and Richaun Holmes, respectively). The Mavericks have won 14 of their last 16 games with the NBA’s top defense since March 6 and strengthened by Gafford’s elite rim protection.
But at least from a personnel standpoint, the Clippers would likely rather see Dallas than any other team with a realistic chance of meeting in the first round. The exception to that preference is the Kings, but they are long shots to get in front of Dallas. The Kings will host the Suns and Pelicans this week in addition to visiting the Thunder before finishing the season at home against the Trail Blazers.
(Photo of Paul George and Kawhi Leonard: Jason Miller / Getty Images)