Doc Rivers says Clippers were ‘soft’ in loss to Golden State Warriors

There was someone harder on the Clippers than the Golden State Warriors on Wednesday night.

It was their coach.

Doc Rivers huddled in a hallway with his assistant coaches long after his team’s 121-104 defeat at Oakland’s Oracle Arena, finally entering the locker room to address his players.

“I didn’t say much,” Rivers said later when he met with reporters. “I just let them blow smoke ... because that’s all they did in there, in my opinion. But I let them just talk it out.”

There were plenty of talking points after an alleged rivalry game in which the Clippers played without passion. They allowed the Warriors to make 58.1% of their shots and an even more absurd 60% of their three-pointers.

Most troubling to Rivers was his team’s hands-off approach. The Clippers didn’t commit their first foul until there were 4 minutes, 3 seconds, left in the second quarter.

“I have never seen that before,” Rivers said. “I’m doing something wrong because that’s as soft as you can probably get in a game.”

These were the same teams that met last spring in the first round of the playoffs, with the Clippers emerging as the victors from a gritty Game 7. The Warriors recaptured the spirit of that series on Wednesday. The Clippers? Not so much.

“If this was a playoff series, we would lose in four games and it would be a destruction,” Rivers said. “They’re tougher, they play harder. From our standpoint, for me, I’ve got to do a better job and I told the guys that this is not their fault. I’ve got to figure it out.”

The Clippers didn’t seem as agitated as their coach amid a somber locker room. Players dressed quietly near a white board that had read “PLAY HARD! PLAY SMART! HAVE FUN!” before the game.

Point guard Chris Paul acknowledged his team’s need to improve but reminded reporters the season was only a week old.

“If this was April or something like that, we’d be [saying], ‘Oh my god,’” Paul said. “But luckily we’ve got time to make this right.”

Rivers figured the game against the undefeated Warriors would be a good measure of his team, which had won three of its first four games despite spotty play. His suspicions about his team’s weaknesses were confirmed and new fears were raised.

“We have holes in our team, we know that, but we should be covering up for them and I don’t think we’re doing a very good job,” Rivers said. “We’re leaving the guys that aren’t good defenders on an island instead of being there to help them.”

Though his team had played five games in seven days, Rivers wasn’t willing to use fatigue as an excuse for lackluster play. He repeated an adage once used by the late Hall of Fame coach Chuck Daly: Even if you have the same players back from the previous season, sometimes you have to wait for them.

“No matter how much you have to push them, you still have to wait for them until they’re ready to play,” Rivers said. “So far, we’re not there and no matter how much we push, we’re just not there and we better get there quickly.”

Twitter: @latbbolch