Clippers will continue to refine lineup and rotations in final preseason game
The look of the Clippers’ roster can be deceiving.
A whopping 14 players who were under contract last season are back. Yet with All-Star wing Kawhi Leonard and backup point guard Jason Preston missing all of last season because of injury, and Norman Powell and Robert Covington spending only two months with the team following their midseason acquisition from Portland, few of those 14 played a significant amount of time together.
Instead of continuity, training camp’s early days have been marked by a learning curve, and though their preseason schedule comes to a close Wednesday against Denver at Ontario’s Toyota Center, their work to refine the strategies that could have them contending for a championship has just begun.
“We brought Kawhi back, got John [Wall, in free agency], now first training camp with RoCo and Norm, like this is a completely new team technically,” said forward Nicolas Batum, entering his third season with the team. “We’re different than last year so we have to get back to a new system on offense and especially on defense.”
Though every player was slated to practice Tuesday, coach Tyronn Lue said the team would wait to gauge how everyone felt before deciding who will play against the Nuggets. Sunday’s preseason loss to Minnesota outlined some of the strategies Lue hopes his team can master.
John Wall led the Clippers with 20 points. Paul George scored 14 and Marcus Morris Sr. added 13 points in a 119-117 preseason loss to the Timberwolves.
For the first time, Lue was able to play a lineup of five wings — Leonard, Covington, Batum, Paul George and Marcus Morris Sr. For now it is more dangerous in theory than application.
“We don’t know how to play out of it yet,” Lue said, noting that Morris had been able to work with that unit for only one day because of time away for the birth of a son. Tuesday’s practice was “going to be a big day for him just learning the [center] position.”
Leonard said Sunday it was hard to judge the all-wings lineup based on a sample size of only a few minutes.
“There’s some good things we were trying to get done late in that second quarter,” he said. “It got a little stagnant a little bit, but this why we got this preseason.”
The Clippers like that lineup, believing it will allow for offensive mismatches while not requiring a sacrifice in rebounding because of the players’ length. They are leaning on Leonard and George to grab misses and push the ball upcourt as the primary ballhandlers.
Playing small with their second unit isn’t as appealing, however, and without a traditional 7-footer as part of the backup rotation, the Clippers have begun tinkering with substituting out starting center Ivica Zubac early to then return with players coming off the bench. Zubac played the first 3 minutes 30 seconds Sunday before resting and returning late in the first quarter to play alongside subs Terance Mann, Luke Kennard and Reggie Jackson.
“I like playing smaller when Kawhi and PG are on the floor, because they can actually rebound,” Lue said. “So right now, just getting Zu out early, bringing him back with that second unit is kind of our focus.”
Kawhi Leonard, a two-time NBA champion, has been a quiet leader by nature, but since returning from injury the Clippers have seen a more vocal teammate.
Another focus for Lue is using Leonard as a pick-and-roll screener to generate mismatches, regardless of whether the Clippers play with big or small lineups. It’s something the Clippers dabbled with, and found success using, during Lue’s first season as coach in 2020-21, with the Clippers averaging 1.40 points on Leonard’s 10 possessions as a roll man, according to Synergy Sports.
If teams switch the screen, leaving a guard defending Leonard, that will be a “huge advantage to us,” Lue said. It could leave Leonard either operating one-on-one off the dribble against a smaller defender or rolling to the basket looking for his own shot or open looks for teammates around the perimeter.
“Norm said that this might be the year we get the most open threes in our career, and that’s the truth,” said Kennard, last season’s league leader in three-point accuracy (44.9%). “With the lineups that we might have, we might be small sometimes, so we’re gonna have guys that roll to the basket and create some opportunities that open up the lane and just kind of opens up the floor.”
Get our high school sports newsletter
Prep Rally is devoted to the SoCal high school sports experience, bringing you scores, stories and a behind-the-scenes look at what makes prep sports so popular.
You may occasionally receive promotional content from the Los Angeles Times.
