Tag Archives: Channing Frye

Five things to take from Clippers’ 114-90 loss to Cleveland Cavaliers

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Branden Dawson

Branden Dawson/Photo courtesy of Los Angeles Clippers

 

– If it’s true Doc Rivers found out just before tip-off about the Sunday morning arrest of rookie Branden Dawson for felony domestic abuse, it couldn’t have been easy for Rivers to focus on the task at hand. As he noted after the game, “Obviously, it’s an awful situation, as far as I’m concerned. I have a daughter, so it’s a terrible situation.” TMZ first reported Dawson’s arrest in Playa Vista, the city in which the Clippers train. He was released on $50,000 bond.

– It’s always strange to see the Clippers play so well for a stretch, then get overwhelmed. They led this game 14-4 after five minutes and scored only five points the rest of the quarter to trail 21-19 entering the second. It’s like the Clippers have some kind of inner on-and-off switch. Of course, the Cavaliers have a lot of good players. They are more than LeBron James.

– One thing’s for sure, Cleveland had a lot of good 3-point shooters in this one. The Cavs made 18 of 37 for 48.6 percent. Asked afterward about his team’s defense at the 3-point line, Rivers said, “Well, what do you think? I thought it was pretty bad.” James made 3 of 4 from distance, Channing Frye 5 of 7 and JR Smith 5 of 8.

– The Clippers (42-23) did not shoot well – 40.5 percent overall, 31.3 percent (10 of 32) from 3-point range. Both Rivers and Chris Paul noted that Cleveland (47-18) played well on defense. But there were plenty of open misses as well. Starting forwards Luc Mbah a Moute (1 of 5) and Jeff Green (2 of 10) combined to shoot 3 of 15 and reserves Jamal Crawford (3 of 11) and Wes Johnson (4 of 13) combined to shoot 7 of 24. It’s hard to win like that, especially against a team with the third-best record in the league.

– The Cavaliers outrebounded the Clippers 49-34. Cleveland’s nine offensive rebounds accounted for 15 second-chance points. The Clippers did not get one point out of their five offensive rebounds.

Lance Stephenson sits out practice; is he about to be traded?

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Lance Stephenson

Lance Stephenson/Photo courtesy of Los Angeles Clippers

 

There was no Clippers trade news to report as of mid-afternoon Wednesday, though rumors of them attempting to acquire power forward Channing Frye from Orlando were still swirling.

Interestingly, one Clippers player allegedly involved in those talks – Lance Stephenson – was said to have a sore hip Wednesday and was to be held out of practice. It could also be that Stephenson is about to be part of that deal and often times when a team knows it’s about to unload a player, it will keep said player on the sideline so he doesn’t sustain an injury before an accord is reached.

 

Flagrant 2 foul by Orlando’s Kyle O’Quinn on Blake Griffin is debated

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Blake Griffin

Blake Griffin (top) was sent to the deck via a hard flagrant 2 foul by Kyle O’Quinn (below) of the Orlando Magic on Wednesday/Photos courtesy of Los Angeles Clippers, Orlando Magic and NBA.com

Kyle O'Quinn

 

Although it appeared that Kyle O’Quinn got what he deserved when he was called for a flagrant 2 foul on Blake Griffin in the second quarter of Wednesday night’s 114-86 Clippers victory over Orlando, Griffin was somewhat surprised by it.

“I didn’t really see much, I closed my eyes,” Griffin said, drawing laughter from reporters in the post-game news conference. “I got hit in the face. But, honestly, I didn’t think it was going to be a flagrant 2. I didn’t think there was anything vicious or anything like that.”

With the Clippers leading 38-35 at the time, Griffin drove the paint and as he was going up he was raked hard across the face by O’Quinn. Griffin went down. To Clippers coach Doc Rivers, the flagrant 2 was warranted.

“That’s a flagrant 2 in this generation,” Rivers said. “I don’t think he was trying to hurt Blake or
anything like that. It was a hard foul and the way the game’s called now, it has to be a flagrant 2.”

With Nikola Vucevic not playing because of back spasms, the flagrant 2 and mandatory ejection of O’Quinn put the Magic down two bigs. After it happened, the Clippers went on an 8-2 run and the rest was history.

“We know Kyle and we know that there was not anything malicious about that,” Orlando power forward Channing Frye said. “They (O’Quinn and Griffin) are 250-pound men. These are two gigantic oxen going up. But that’s the way it went, and I think emotionally we just felt kind of let down from that and they took advantage of us.”