Vaught Makes Most of Minutes : Pro basketball: Forward gets 20 points and 14 rebounds as the Clippers defeat the Bullets, 108-95.

Shooters in a can’t-miss mode will sometimes say the basket seems twice as big as it really is. Rebounders after a good night might say the ball comes off the rim looking like a beach ball.

Loy Vaught says that he is a quality player, given the time to prove it.

Again taking advantage of significant playing time, Vaught had 20 points and a game-high 14 rebounds as the Clippers went into the All-Star break with a 108-95 victory over the Washington Bullets on Thursday night before 9,549 at the Sports Arena.

Vaught has had, or tied, the game high in rebounding in three of the last five outings, averaging 10.8 and 14 points in that span. He is also shooting 58.5% in the last nine games.

“I’m a guy who can rebound and could be in the top 10 or top seven in the league if I got the same minutes as all the other guys, 30 to 35 a game,” Vaught said. “Rebounding is something I can do. It’s not a matter of being in a zone. It’s a matter of getting the minutes.”

He played 31 minutes against the Bullets, after getting 12 rebounds in 29 minutes last Monday against San Antonio.

“He was great,” Coach Larry Brown said after the Clippers ended a seven-game home losing streak to Washington. “I’m proud of him. He had live legs, did a lot of great things and made some big-time plays. With Kenny (Norman) sick, it’s given him a chance to play more. We haven’t won a lot of those games, but not because of him.”

The Bullets came to the Sports Arena with a four-game losing streak and with leading scorer Harvey Grant sidelined because of a strained right calf and Rex Chapman out because of a sprained right ankle.

Grant’s absence on the final stop of a seven-game, 11-day trip resulted in the first pro start for Don MacLean. The rookie from UCLA thought he would become a Clipper after they acquired him from Detroit in a draft-day trade, but he was sent to the Bullets before the start of training camp in the deal that brought John Williams to Los Angeles.

“I planned to play for this team and they traded me away,” he said before the game. “I want to play well against them. It’s not like I have any dissension against the organization or anything, I would just like to play well for someone to say, ‘Hey, maybe we should not have given him up.’ ”

MacLean started well, and so did the Bullets. Washington, in last place in the Atlantic Division, trailed only 50-45 with 2:46 to play in the second quarter, but the Clippers finished with a 10-2 run for a 60-47 lead at halftime. MacLean had 10 points and six rebounds, and finished with 14 and eight, respectively.

*

Clipper Notes

Gary Grant thought as recently as last Sunday that it would take until after the All-Star break for his strained right shoulder to heal, but recovery came faster than expected. Grant, who injured the shoulder Feb. 2 against Phoenix and sat out the Feb. 6 game against Sacramento, went into Thursday night’s game having made only seven of 32 attempts (21.9%) in the previous five games. He played 23 minutes and scored two points against the Bullets. . . John Williams, who spent the first six years of his pro career with the Bullets before being traded to the Clippers, played against his former team for the first time, playing 26 minutes and scoring five points. . . . Jaren Jackson, on the injured list since breaking his ankle Jan. 12, took two steps this week toward returning. On Monday, he got out of the walking cast and was given clearance to shoot jumpers at practice. On Wednesday, the reserve guard started jogging. Jackson is about two weeks away from returning to full practices. . . . Ken Norman, on the disabled list because of chickenpox, is scheduled to see a doctor Monday in Los Angeles and might return Tuesday against Sacramento at the Sports Arena, the Clippers’ first game after the All-Star break.