Clippers Can’t Get Past the Heat

Lamar Odom was back in the house, an unwelcome guest.

The former Clipper forward was booed every time he touched the ball Friday night, the jeers turning to cheers only when he fell and lost the ball out of bounds with 8.9 seconds to play, giving the Clippers one last chance to beat the Miami Heat.

Back at the scene of his “basketball hell,” as Odom had described his four seasons with the Clippers, he still walked off the court a winner after the clock ran out before the Clippers got off a shot.

The Heat won, 87-85, in front of 14,233 at Staples Center.

The Clippers, who had won four in a row over Heat, battled back from a 10-point third-quarter deficit to pull within 84-83, but a three-point field goal from the left corner by former Laker Eddie Jones short-circuited the rally.

At the end, the Clippers got the ball into one of their best players on offense, forward Corey Maggette, who was guarded by Odom on the right wing. The ball didn’t leave Maggette’s hands before the horn sounded.

“We play hard,” Clipper Coach Mike Dunleavy said, “but we shot ourselves in the foot. We had a couple plays, a couple situations, that we just did a poor job of executing. We broke down a little bit.”

The Clippers were out of timeouts when Odom, who finished with 11 points and 15 rebounds, fell to the floor and lost the ball out of bounds.

What play did the Clippers plan?

“I don’t want to say,” Dunleavy said, “but that wasn’t it.”

Said Odom: “I knew they had no timeouts left so instead of huffing and puffing [after the turnover] I put all my effort into shutting Maggette down.”

Maggette scored 21 points, but missed 13 of 19 shots. Elton Brand led the Clippers with 22 points and 12 rebounds. Eddie House, who played three seasons for the Heat, scored 17 points in a rare start and Marko Jaric had eight points and 11 assists.

Jones made four of seven three-point shots and scored 21 points for the Heat, which made only 37.2% of its shots but still stopped a four-game losing streak.

The Clippers again played without Quentin Richardson, who sat out for the third time in four games because of a sprained right hand.

“He came in and tried it,” Dunleavy said before the game, “but it just wasn’t good.”

The Heat was without injured rookie guard Dwayne Wade and playing the fifth game of a six-game trip that had not started well, four consecutive losses dropping its record to 15-24, 4-18 on the road.

Stunned by Pat Riley’s resignation as coach four days before the start of the season, the Heat started 0-7 before breaking out of its stupor to bring its record to 14-19 two weeks ago. Since then, however, it had lost five of six.

Odom, unconvincingly, called it “just another game,” but that was before he was booed. He scored six of his points and nine of his rebounds in the first quarter.

“You play in a place for four years, you get used to being there and it’s shocking when you’re not,” he said before the game. “But you just have to move on.

“We’re only one or two games out of the eighth spot [in the watered-down Eastern Conference], so I can’t take this game and have personal vendettas. I’ve just got to go and do my best to help my team pick up some ground.”

Clipper forward Bobby Simmons suffered knee and groin injuries with 1:58 to play in the third quarter. X-rays on his left knee were negative, but he is expected to undergo further tests.

“It doesn’t sound good,” Dunleavy said.