He insisted that his group could play better and had to play better even though the Clippers snatched home-court advantage away from the Nuggets by winning Game 2 in Denver.
That didn’t matter to Clippers coach Tyronn Lue.
What mattered to Lue was his team pushing itself to a higher level against the Nuggets.
The Clippers found another gear, fielding a stingy defense and a balanced scoring attack that helped them build a 31-point lead en route to a convincing 117-83 win over the Nuggets on Thursday night. The rowdy crowd celebrated the first playoff game ever hosted at the Intuit Dome.
Six Clippers scored in double figures and that was a big reason they now have a 2-1 lead in the Western Conference first-round playoff series.
“We got to build off it. It’s only two games, but today I liked our approach,” Lue said. “I liked what we did defensively. It’s still going to be a tough series. It ain’t over cause we had a blowout. It’s only one game. So, we got to be ready to come and validate that on Saturday.”
After a slow start to the series, Norman Powell appears to have found his groove, scoring 20 points on seven-for-12 shooting.
Kawhi Leonard had a double-double with 21 points and 11 rebounds in 35 minutes.
James Harden scored all 20 of his points in the first half to go along with nine assists and six rebounds.
Ivica Zubac had 19 points and nine rebounds, Nicolas Batum came off the bench to score 12 points, doing his damage by going four for six from the three-point line, and Derrick Jones Jr. had 10 points.
“We have to keep watching film, get better,” said Batum, who also had three blocked shots. “We have to be ready for them on Saturday because they are going to be ready for us.”
The Clippers played perhaps their best defense of the series, holding the Nuggets to 40.3% shooting and 26.9% from three-point range while keeping their offense out of sorts.
And so with four minutes and 34 seconds left and the Nuggets about to go down by 26 points, Nuggets interim coach David Adelman pulled his starters to get them ready for Game 4 at the Intuit Dome on Saturday afternoon.
Nuggets center Nikola Jokic had his second straight triple-double with 23 points, 13 rebounds and 13 assists, but the Clippers overcame his outstanding play.
“That’s what he does. He’s an all-around player,” Zubac said about Jokic. “He makes plays not just for himself. He makes plays for his teammates all the time. … He’s probably the best player in the league. He’s going to get his, so just got to stay locked in with our game plan, don’t worry about what he got.”
Harden set the tone early for the Clippers, his shot-making and passing allowing them to open a seven-point lead to end the first quarter.
Harden scored 11 of the Clippers’ final 16 points in the first and assisted on three more when he found Batum for a three-pointer with 1.5 seconds left in the first. He was six for 10 from the field and three for five from three-point range in the first half.
It allowed the Clippers to build a 20-point lead in the second quarter, adding to it as the crowd cheered on the dominant performance.
With the crowd cheering them on, the Clippers kept pushing forward.
“When tip-off came, the whole arena was filled and it was packed, sold out all the way to the top,” Powell said. “The energy was amazing from start to finish. I’m glad our first playoff game was a win here. But we still have more work today. We got to be ready and focused and locked in on Saturday.
“They’re a great team, they are a championship team, so we got to be ready to play.”