WITH MORE THAN seven minutes remaining in Game 5 of the LA Clippers‘ first-round series, coach Ty Lue had seen enough.
Lue pulled starters Ivica Zubac and James Harden, who sank into his seat on the bench next to Paul George. Two seats over sat an injured Kawhi Leonard, watching a 123-93 loss to the Dallas Mavericks that put the Clippers in a 3-2 hole in the series.
In what would be the Clippers’ final home game in Crypto.com Arena (before they move to Inglewood’s Intuit Dome next season), the team was on the brink of another first-round elimination.
The home crowd, including well-known Clippers fan Billy Crystal, had also seen enough as the majority of them left early. With 8.1 seconds left, Harden and other players began walking off the floor and into the tunnel to a smattering of boos.
Little did the Clippers know that they would not find any refuge in their own locker room after the 30-point loss. Adding insult to the worst playoff loss in franchise history was Mavericks forward P.J. Washington, the Clippers’ newest antagonist who struck the now-infamous arms-folded mean-mugging pose in Game 3, and wasn’t done trolling them.
Directly across the hallway from the Clippers’ locker room, the Mavericks had set up a temporary weight room. Only a thin curtain held up by poles in the middle of the hallway separated both rooms. Washington placed a loudspeaker at the door of Dallas’ weight room and blasted rap music that carried down a long entry way into the Clippers’ locker room.
Sources told ESPN when Clippers security shut the Mavericks’ weight room door as many as four times, Washington would open the door each time. He finally stopped after 10 minutes once Harden’s security guard stood in front of the door.
It was an hour later before some of the last Clippers to leave the locker room learned where the music was coming from.
“That was loud as s—!” one Clippers player said.
This is how the Clippers’ final home game at the arena they had called home for 25 seasons ended. As if a frustrated fan base and a historic defeat wasn’t enough to stomach,…
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