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Swanson: Clippers-Nuggets first-round series proving great theater

April 27, 2025

INGLEWOOD — This series!

It might be dressed up as a first-round Western Conference playoff tilt, but the fourth-seeded Denver Nuggets vs. the fifth-seeded Clippers is a psychological thriller, one of those page-turners that will keep you up past your bedtime. That might even be studied one day, taught in classes – or at least replayed as an NBA TV Classic.

Clippers star Kawhi Leonard said he’s happy to be a part of this thing, which has featured an overtime Denver win, a masterclass from a rebooted Leonard in a chippy Clippers’ win in Game 2, a 34-point Clippers blowout (suitable non-drama, Game 3 turned out to be, for NBA TV) and then Saturday’s roller coaster ride that resulted in the Nuggets’ 101-99 win. This latest chapter tied the series 2-2, turning it into a best-of-three as it heads back to Denver for Game 5 on Tuesday night.

Nuggets coach David Adelman said both teams should be proud of how they’re playing their parts through a series of twists and turns so innovative these guys came up with a fresh version of a buzzer-beater on Saturday.

How many times did you watch a replay of Aaron Gordon skying and grabbing Nikola Jokic’s airball – “This is going to be bad,” he said he thought as he watched his shot’s errant flightpath – and dunking it home basically as time expired, or as close as anyone could get to that.

It was a basketball Rorschach test, as Matt Moore, Action Network NBA Writer, posted on social media after Gordon’s heads-up, go-ahead bucket.

If you’re a Nuggets fan, you thought: It’s good! Obviously, it’s good!

If you’re a Clippers fan the first 50 times you watched it, you swore it wasn’t. No way, heck no.

But the white-and-gold dress actually was blue and black, and even if Denver’s vibes seemed bad, with Nuggets players reportedly “going at it” in the locker room, their champion’s heart isn’t.

Mark Daigneault, head coach of the top-seeded Oklahoma City Thunder team that eliminated eighth-seeded Memphis in a sweep that was way short on suspense, and now is waiting offstage for either the Clippers or Nuggets to survive this series, talked once about teaching his then-even-less-experienced team about “competitive empathy.” It was a term he came up with to describe appreciating an opponent’s mental state.

Let’s say, then, that the Clippers didn’t have enough competitive empathy out of the gate Saturday, when Denver showed up to play Saturday afternoon with desperation suitable for a team that didn’t want to face a 3-1 deficit.

And the Clippers, despite themselves, despite how beautifully they played in their 117-83 victory in Game 3, couldn’t bring the same energy the Nuggets had Saturday until the fourth quarter, when desperation set in for the hosts, who really didn’t want to go back to Denver with the series squared.

The Nuggets built a 22-point lead with 11:12 to play. The gap was so sizable because Denver came out roaring in the third quarter, winning the frame, 35-17 – extra-inspired, perhaps, probably, by the skirmish just before halftime?

The dust up started with James Harden and Christian Braun and soon included everyone who was on the court for both teams, with Gordon charging in and smacking Norman Powell in the face before being bear-hugged into submission by Ivica Zubac, the Clippers’ 7-foot center.

That ruckus earned six players – three per team – a technical foul, but no one an ejection. And, yes, it reminded Nuggets fans of their team’s 3-1 series comeback in the 2020 bubble, because they way those folks remember that series turning was when Marcus Morris and Paul Millsap faced off in Game 5, when the Clippers were on the precipice of reaching the conference finals for the first time. After that standoff, Denver caught fire in the second half and won the game – and the next two, too.

But on Saturday, it was the Clippers who returned fire, shooting 60.9% in a turnover-free fourth quarter, as if they just needed a hard, fast deadline, some external pressure to get them to stop procrastinating and lock in if they didn’t want to forsake the series advantage they’d worked hard to build – human nature striking again.

Led by Leonard’s 10, Powell’s nine and Harden’s seven points, the Clippers outscored Denver 34-12 to wipe out that 22-point deficit. And then Gordon crashed the glass and the Intuit Dome party.

That buzzer-beating put-back dunk ensured at least two more games in this most compelling, most suspenseful – and alternately heartbreaking and frustrating, elating and confounding – of series.

The Clippers might not appreciate that now; they might appreciate it never.

Or might they?

“I’m happy to be out there and play,” said Leonard, who has had injuries rob him of opportunities like these in the Clippers’ past three playoff series. “… a 4-5 seeding series, usually get some tough battles in these seeds … we pretty much got the same record, the matchups might be different and a different style of play but both teams are fighting to win.

“Best-of-three and we’ll see what happens.”

Whatever test of character comes at them in the next two or three games, it figures to keep us on the edge or our seats.

Orange County Register

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Swanson: Clippers-Nuggets first-round series proving great theater

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