Clippers Look Ugly, Lose 60th as Result : Pro basketball: Kings stay in playoff race in very easy 117-85 victory in woeful rematch.

Yawn.

That was the sound of the Clippers reaching the 60-loss mark for the first time since 1988-89.

After beating the Sacramento Kings in overtime Saturday night at Sacramento, the Clippers fell behind by 36 points in the fourth quarter and lost the rematch, 117-85, Tuesday night before an announced crowd of 8,836 at the Sports Arena.

“If anybody loses 60 games I imagine they would be upset, right?” Clipper swingman Charles Outlaw said. “Unless you’re playing 1,000 games and you lose 60, you’re doing just great. But in this situation, 60 is a lot and we’re not happy with that. You don’t go out there to lose, you go out there to win.”

Swingman Tony Massenburg agreed. “It doesn’t really matter that we lost our 60th game. I stopped keeping track of wins, losses and other stats a long time ago,” he said.

The Kings, who shot 87.5% (14 of 16) in the third quarter, made 27 of 35 shots (77.1%) in the second half and outscored the Clippers, 64-40.

“Tough night,” Clipper Coach Bill Fitch said. “If they’re all like this they get tougher. To a man we all know we played a poor game and coached a poor game (and) we got the results of a poor game.

“We had too many guys put bad games together tonight. If you’ve got one or two guys who have a bad night sometimes you get by with it, but when two, three or four guys have bad nights we’re not strong enough to cover that.”

All-Star guard Mitch Richmond, who had 44 points Saturday against the Clippers, had 26 points and five rebounds as the Kings (36-39) kept pace with the Denver Nuggets (36-39) for the eighth and final Western Conference playoff berth. The Kings play at Denver in the season finale on April 23.

King guard Walt Williams, who missed the first game because of lower back spasms, had 25 points, six rebounds and five assists as the Kings defeated the Clippers for the fourth time in five games.

“Walt Williams makes a difference to their team,” Fitch said. “We laid off in a few spots (last Saturday) because they didn’t have Walt to throw the ball at. He’s very important to them.”

The Clippers, who need to win two of their final six games to avoid tying the second-worst record in franchise history, will help decide whether the Kings or Nuggets make the playoffs.

The Clippers face the Nuggets Thursday night at the Sports Arena in their next-to-last home game.

The Clippers had a ready-made excuse because Loy Vaught, their leading scorer and rebounder, missed his second consecutive game because of a hyperextended right elbow.

Massenburg, who had a career-high 26 points in Saturday’s 112-105 overtime victory at Sacramento, started in place of Vaught, and Eric Riley replaced Massenburg at center.

“(Massenburg) played a great game,” Fitch said of that outing. “It was like a night off for him because he got to play his own position. The challenge is for him to do it again, because they know he can do it.”

This time, however, Massenburg missed seven of 10 shots and had 10 points and five rebounds and Riley had five points and three rebounds as the Clippers were outrebounded, 48-24.

“Everybody had a bad night, everybody,” Massenburg said. “Nobody could pick it up.”

Clipper Notes

Guard Malik Sealy, who has been sidelined for the last 10 games because of a strained left hip, thinks he’ll be sidelined for the last six games of the season. “I practiced twice and felt good, but the third day it (hurt),” Sealy said. “It felt the same as when I did it in Minnesota. It’s taking longer than I thought.”