Clippers take cautious approach with Milos Teodosic

The Clippers prefer to be safe with Milos Teodosic in his return from a foot injury that sidelined him almost two months.

Perhaps he could have played Friday night against the Washington Wizards at the Capital One Arena, but the Clippers decided hold him out until Saturday night’s game at Miami.

“Milos, because of the minutes restrictions, we can’t play him on back-to-backs,” Clippers coach Doc Rivers said. “So we have to sit him.”

Teodosic played in the last two games after missing the previous 22 recovering from a plantar fascia injury to his left foot

He played 20 minutes, 32 seconds in his first game against the Toronto Raptors on Monday and 25:26 in the second game against the Orlando Magic on Wednesday.

At some point, Rivers said, Teodosic won’t be restricted and he won’t have to sit out games.

“It’ll just be for a little while,” Rivers said. “Especially because of the traveling, we’re going to very cautious with back-to-backs with Milos.”

Austin Rivers out

Austin Rivers cleared several hurdles in the NBA’s concussion protocol, but not enough to allow him to play Saturday.

Rivers suffered the concussion in the first half against the Magic.

He knew he wasn’t going to play Friday but had assumed he’d be cleared to play Saturday.

“I don’t stress over things I cannot control,” Austin Rivers said. “I want to play tonight, but I can’t. The NBA won’t let me. I know I can play tonight. There is nothing wrong with me. But I understand why they are taking precautions because if nine [cases] go right and that one person does play, the NBA is at fault. So I get it. I’ll be back for San Antonio.”

The San Antonio game is Monday night, giving Rivers five days to completely recover.

“Austin — with the concussion and with the new protocol, which is good — that automatically rules him out,” Doc Rivers said. “He passed the protocol test (Friday), but I think it’s 48 hours after you pass the test that you can play. He’ll probably be out for a couple of games.”

Without Teodosic and Rivers, the Clippers were down to four guards – Lou Williams, Jawun Evan, Sindarius Thornwell and C.J. Williams.

Lou Williams and Thornwell started against the Wizards.

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broderick.turner@latimes.com

Twitter: @BA_Turner