Clippers Don’t Go Out on Rim

The Clippers gave away a 17-point lead Sunday afternoon, handling the ball as if it were toxic and watching the one Houston Rocket who can consistently score from the perimeter get loose again and again.

Just when it threatened to get really embarrassing, a funny thing happened.

The Clippers rallied and won.

Eric Piatkowski’s runner off the glass, and Yao Ming’s fingertips, with 1.4 seconds remaining gave the Clippers a 90-89 victory over the Rockets before 16,876 at Staples Center.

Yao was whistled for goaltending, but the consensus at game’s end was that Piatkowski’s shot, which danced on the rim, was going to fall regardless.

“It was in,” Piatkowski said of the last of his 14 points.

“I thought it was in the hole,” Houston Coach Rudy Tomjanovich agreed. “You’ve got to credit Piatkowski for making a tough shot.”

The Rockets had one more crack at a victory, but Steve Francis’ off-balance shot at the buzzer was off the mark. Francis had swished a three-pointer over Andre Miller and Quentin Richardson to beat the third-quarter buzzer and give the Rockets a 69-66 lead.

As has become their method of operation, the Clippers (5-9) built an early lead but couldn’t hold it. They led by 17 points several times, the last at 37-20 on Keyon Dooling’s jump shot early in the second quarter, and held a 48-34 advantage after Piatkowski made a layup just before halftime.

But the Clippers committed too many turnovers -- a whopping 23 that led to 24 points for the Rockets by game’s end -- to maintain their big lead. They also lost track too often of Houston’s Glen Rice, who scored 18 of his 23 points in the third quarter, and the Rockets rallied into the lead.

Houston (7-5) led by six, 89-83, after Rice dunked with 1:24 to play, when the Clippers rallied. Miller scored on a drive, then made one of two free throws. Actually, he made two, but was whistled for stepping over the line on the first one.

Michael Olowokandi’s seven-foot hook shot over Yao at the right baseline brought the Clippers within 89-88 with 37.8 seconds left. Yao, who had four points in 28 minutes, missed a hurried shot at the other end.

“We were trying to get the ball to Elton [Brand],” Piatkowski said of the final play.

And with good reason. Brand scored a season-best 26 points on nine-for-14 shooting and had 15 rebounds in 46 minutes of relentless play.

But the Rockets bottled up Brand on the Clippers’ final possession and, according to Piatkowski, “He was yelling at me, so I came off the pick and Andre threw me the ball. I wasn’t sure how much time was left, but he yelled at me to shoot it, so it couldn’t have been very much.”

Piatkowski’s shot kissed the glass and rattled around on the rim before it looked as if it would drop through. At the last possible moment, Yao tipped the ball away, which is legal in international play but forbidden in the NBA.

Despite the cheers of the fans, the Clippers still had to sweat out the final 1.4 seconds. After all, they gave up James Posey’s winning jump shot at the buzzer Friday that capped the Denver Nuggets’ rally from a 16-point deficit in the fourth quarter. But Francis, who had 31 points and 10 assists, couldn’t connect.

“It was a much-needed win for us,” Coach Alvin Gentry said after the Clippers won for the second time in seven games at Staples. “Obviously, we’ve been struggling. I shouldn’t say struggling. We’ve played well in spurts.”

That has been the trouble for the Clippers in recent games in which they have led entering the fourth quarter. Their bad patches have happened late.

“We found a way to win the game,” Gentry said. “Hopefully, this will springboard into something good for us. We played extremely hard and we executed. The big thing was that we won. We haven’t been a very good home team. Hopefully, this gives us something to build on.”

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*--* Yao and Then Before Sunday’s four-point effort against the Clippers, 7-foot-5 rookie center Yao Ming had been steadily improving and starting to show why the Houston Rockets made him the top pick in the draft. Comparing Yao’s numbers in his first six games to his last six: First six Min FG-FGA FG% Reb Blk Pts 14.2 8-18 44.4% 3.7 0.3 3.3 Last six Min FG-FGA FG% Reb Blk Pts 24.7 36-47 76.6% 7.5 1.8 13.5

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