Clippers Take Early Holiday

Piloting the callow Clippers, Coach Mike Dunleavy has said, means constantly striving to keep them from destroying themselves.

“As a coach, you always look at it like it’s an addiction problem,” he said of his young team’s propensity for repeating destructive behavior. “You can’t ever think that it’s gone away forever. It’s something that is constantly there, and you’ve always got to monitor it and do your daily steps, reminders.”

And occasionally, such as Tuesday night, there is a relapse.

Seventy-two hours after manufacturing their most impressive road game of the season, the Clippers coughed up what may have been their worst, losing to the San Antonio Spurs, 111-90, in front of 18,797 in the SBC Center.

“We didn’t even give them a game,” Dunleavy lamented.

After a 115-105 victory over the Dallas Mavericks on Saturday, the Clippers turned the ball over a season-high 25 times and all but gift-wrapped the pre-holiday blowout for the Spurs, who didn’t really need the help.

The defending NBA champions have won their last 11 games. They haven’t lost since Dec. 3, when the Lakers beat them at the SBC Center two nights after the Clippers had defeated them in L.A.

In their Dec. 1 loss to the Clippers, which forward Tim Duncan sat out while serving a one-game suspension for pushing a referee, Spur guards Tony Parker and Manu Ginobili combined to make only six of 27 shots.

In the rematch, Parker made nine of 12 shots, penetrated at will, scored a season-high 19 points and had a career-high 14 assists.

“We couldn’t guard him,” Dunleavy said.

Ginobili made six of 10 shots, three of five from beyond the three-point arc, and scored 16 points. He also had five assists and three of the Spurs’ 14 steals.

And Duncan led the Spurs with 22 points and 10 rebounds.

The Spurs made 56% of their shots, high for a Clipper opponent this season. They scored 36 points off Clipper turnovers.

“Just horrible decision making and execution on our part,” said Dunleavy, who has tried to get the Clippers to kick their bad habits and value each possession. “They’re a very good defensive team, very smart. They read situations well....

“It’s a good lesson. I hate to take it, but it’s a good lesson. It’s a good example of what you can do if you’re alert and you’re defending well.”

Wrapping up a three-game Texas swing that also included a Friday night loss at Houston, the Clippers started well and led, 17-15, before the Spurs strung together a 17-2 first-quarter run that blew the game open.

And another strong effort by Elton Brand, who made nine of 11 shots and had 22 points and 13 rebounds, went for naught.

The Clippers had eight turnovers before the Spurs had their first. They had 15 in the first half, leading to 25 Spur points, then started the second half with a possession that ended with Corey Maggette, before he had crossed midcourt, dribbling the ball off his left foot and out of bounds.

The Spurs already led at that point, 64-43, and the Clippers’ seventh loss in their last eight road games was all but signed and sealed.

“It’s definitely tough to end the trip like this,” Quentin Richardson said. “Win, lose or draw, we didn’t really play well. That hurts the most. You play well and you lose to a team like that, you don’t really mind. But we didn’t play well.”

Nobody had to tell Dunleavy.

“We played so poorly that we made it easy for them,” he said.

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Olden Polynice was activated before the game when Melvin Ely, who has been sidelined because of influenza, was put on the injured list. Ely won’t be eligible to be reactivated until Jan. 3.