Beijing time on February 16, today, the NBA ushered in a strong dialogue, Phoenix Suns at home to meet the Los Angeles Clippers, which is a contest between the first place in the West and the eighth place in the West. In terms of rankings, the Suns clearly have a big advantage, but the Clippers are a very resilient team, and they completed a reversal to beat their opponents in yesterday's game against the Warriors. This time facing the sun, the Clippers can be said to be prepared. In the first quarter, the Clippers, led by Batum and Morris Jr., won without losing, leading their opponents by four points at 26-22.
Entering the second quarter, Booker continued to have a good hand, leading the team to launch a counterattack, Paul also used a pass to break through the opponent's defense line, half-time, the Suns completed the counterattack, 53-47 ahead of the opponent by 6 points. Easy side to fight again, the Clippers came to play a wave of 11-5 small climax to tie the score, soon, Bridges quick attack counterattack consecutive dunks, but Reggie and Zubac also scored 4 points, back, Bridges turned around and threw and hit again, Reggie more and more courageous to join hands with Morris to get 4 points, Paul stood up at this time, using the cover mid-range suddenly cold arrows, the game was suspended.
Coming back from the timeout, Bridges burst into a 2+1, followed by Booker first layup to score 2 points, and then quickly attacked the three-point rain, Batum did not hesitate to let go, drifting high difficulty 2 points to stop the bleeding, but Booker was like a god, joined forces with Bridges to score 4 points, just 8 seconds later, Booker received Paul's pass and hit the bottom corner of the three points, the Clippers side, Kennard quick-eyed, fast attack pass to the downward Covington, the latter scored 2 points on the board, the third quarter ended, the Suns 81-72 led the opponent by 9 points.
In the final quarter, Johnson came up and hit a shot, Covington changed to a goal in front of the basket, and after that, Kennard hit two three-pointers in just one minute, and the Suns asked for a timeout. After the timeout, Harten threw a throw to take 2 points first, Paul made a mistake after hitting the mid-range, Covington quick-attack dunked and then scored 2 points, and Johnson also had a three-pointer on the left side of the arc, but Kennard's mid-range shot blossomed again. Soon, Reggie threw a throw to complete the rebound, Johnson went to the basket to tie again, after Reggie missed the throw, Paul quickly attacked the three-pointer, the Suns led by 3 points, and the Clippers were stopped.
In the decisive moment, Reggie slipped the bottom line hook to score 2 points, Paul assisted Ayton dunk, and then, Paul and Booker connected to assist the latter to complete the empty connection, but Morris felt hot, against Bridges shot three points, however, Ginger is still old spicy, Paul played 2 points also. At the crucial moment, the Clippers made a mistake, Paul assisted Bridges to hit a three-pointer to kill the game, and in the end, the Suns narrowly beat the Clippers 103-96. After this game, the Suns won six consecutive games, with a record of 47 wins and 10 losses, ranking first in the West, and the Clippers' two-game winning streak was ended, with a record of 29 wins and 31 losses, ranking eighth in the West.
In this game, Paul's performance in the first half of the general situation, the fourth quarter of the gods down, the whole game, he played 35 minutes, 14 of 7, cut 17 points, 5 rebounds, 14 assists and 1 steal, plus or minus +12, the fly in the ointment is that Paul made 3 mistakes in this game, but there is no doubt that Paul is the biggest contributor to the team's victory, at the end of the fourth quarter, he gave 3 consecutive assists, pouring out the hope of the Clippers to fight back, I have to say that Paul is really the older the demon; Booker performed well in this game, he played for 36 minutes, 11-of-19, contributing 26 points, 3 rebounds, 4 assists and 3 steals, 4 turnovers, plus-minus +9.
In addition, Bridges contributed 19 points and 9 rebounds on 8-of-14 shooting, Ayton scored 6-of-16 with 12 points and 12 rebounds, and Johnson scored 9 points. On the Clippers side, Reggie played crazy in the game, playing 36 minutes, 7 of 26, only 14 points, 2 rebounds and 8 assists, Morris was in good shape, 10 of 17, cut 23 points and 4 rebounds, Batum was 7 of 14, had 18 points and 7 rebounds, Kennard was 4 of 8, light 11 points, 4 rebounds and 4 assists, Zubac had 12 points, 13 rebounds and 5 assists, Mann had 2 points and 3 rebounds. The game once again highlighted Paul's value, and it turned out that Paul's arrival allowed the Sun to complete the metamorphosis, and the Sun's 30 million was too much to spend.