Clippers bounce back to beat Suns, 124-114

Blake Griffin is only a month removed from arthroscopic knee surgery, so he probably shouldn’t be doing much heavy lifting. But Wednesday night he lifted the Clippers onto his broad shoulders just the same, carrying them to 124-114 victory over the Phoenix Suns that might soon prove bigger than just another game in the standings.

Consider that the Clippers started the night having lost four of their last five games, one of which was the most one-sided loss in six seasons. The team was without star point guard Chris Paul, lost center DeAndre Jordan to a flagrant-two foul midway through the third quarter and gave up most of a double-digit lead early in the fourth.

But they still had Griffin. And that proved enough.

“This was the best Blake today, by far,” Clippers Coach Doc Rivers said. “He played in different gears. He knew when to go, he knew when not to.”

He also knew when to score, finishing with a team-high 29 points, and when to get flashy, splitting two defenders with a pass between his legs that set J.J. Redick up for a basket.

“If it was a turnover,” Griffin said with a grin, “I’d look really bad.”

Instead it was a highlight-reel play in a first quarter in which Griffin’s 13 points and three assists and Jordan’s eight rebounds and three blocked shots helped the Clippers to an early 11-point lead.

Then they stalled, with Griffin going scoreless in the final 131/2 minutes of the half and the Suns, behind 16 points from Eric Bledsoe, cutting the deficit to three.

The Clippers answered with a 15-4 third-quarter run punctuated by a pair of layups from Austin Rivers, a monster dunk from Griffin and three Suns turnovers. But then they lost Jordan to the flagrant foul with five minutes to play in the third quarter and Phoenix rose again.

Jordan was ejected after raking Marquese Chriss across the upper body as the Suns’ forward went up for a dunk.

“I didn’t agree with it at all,” Jordan, who finished with a team-high 12 rebounds in less than 23 minutes, his shortest outing since December 2015, said of the call. “I don’t want to get fined. But if I’m 6-foot-11, 280 pounds, if I flagrant two somebody, they’re probably not going to get up.”

Chriss did get up, helping the Suns go on a run of their own, outscoring the Clippers 22-11 to pull to within 94-93 early in the final period.

But that was as close as Griffin would let them get.

“I’m proud of how we stuck with it,” Griffin said. “We stayed with it and dug it out in the end.”

Added Jamal Crawford, who had 14 points: “Blake is dynamic. He’s unbelievable. That’s why he’s always in the MVP conversation. There’s a top bar of guys in the NBA and he’s on top shelf.

“That’s who Blake is.”

Bledsoe, a former Clipper, matched a career-high with 41 points for Phoenix while three Clippers followed Griffin and Crawford into double figures, including Rivers, who had 14, marking the eighth consecutive game in which he’s scored in double digits, a career high.

“Right now they’re all big for us,” Doc Rivers said of the victory. “We’re just scrambling for each win. We’re just in the mode of survival. Each game we’re turning it into a singular game and we have to have great focus.”

kevin.baxter@latimes.com

Twitter: kbaxter11