It was more of an issue at midseason, when the Clippers were struggling following their 17-game losing streak, but Del Negro brought up the issue of his team restraining itself on the court without any prompting.
After all, he has to cover all bases for a team that has double-digit technical foul players like Griffin (14), Matt Barnes (10) and DeAndre Jordan (10). Jamal Crawford added nine and Lamar Odom seven.
“We’ve addressed it a few times,” Del Negro said. “I want us to play with emotion, I want us to play with a lot of energy. But you’ve got to play the next play. You can’t assume anything, especially in playoff games.
“Play the next play, you can’t worry about the refs, you’ve got to stay in the zone, you’ve got to stay in your mindset, you’ve got to know what the execution process is and hopefully we’ll control our emotions from that standpoint and be able to execute.
“If you get ahead of yourself a little bit and you’re so amped up and you’re trying to do things faster than you need to — once we get our feet under us as the game gets started, we’ll be fine.”
The Grizzlies were the annoyed team in the first half Saturday, with starters Zach Randolph, Tony Allen and Mike Conley picking up two fouls each in the first quarter and Keyon Dooling being called for a technical early in the second quarter.
Conley picked up his third foul with 2:10 left in the second quarter on a jump shot by Chauncey Billups then bounced into the basket. Billups couldn’t converted the three-point play, though.