|
Roy Hibbert had 26 points and 10 rebounds before fouling out, Paul George added 23 points and 10 assists, and the Indiana Pacers barely completed a sweep of their four-game road trip with a 109-106 victory over the Los Angeles Clippers on Monday night in a battle of division leaders.
Hibbert, who was serving a one-game suspension from the league when the Pacers lost to the Clippers 99-91 at Indianapolis on Feb. 28, made all eight of his shots in the first half and finished 11 for 14 from the field to help his team extend its winning streak to five and increase its Central Division lead to 6 1/2 games over idle Chicago.
All five Pacers starters scored in double figures, with David West getting 16 and backcourt mates Lance Stephenson and George Hill chipping in with 13 apiece.
Jamal Crawford scored 25 points off the bench for the Pacific Division-leading Clippers, whose magic number to clinch the first division title in the franchise’s 43-year history remained at two. They failed on their third attempt at their 50th victory, which would break the franchise record set by the 1974-75 Buffalo Braves. Blake Griffin had 17 points.
Center DeAndre Jordan, whose games this season have fluctuated between dominant and invisible, played 17 scoreless minutes and went to the bench for good with 6:26 left in the third quarter. The Clippers were outscored 42-25 while he was on the floor…
The loss snapped the Clippers’ franchise-record streak of 10 straight wins against Eastern Conference opponents. … Los Angeles has a better winning percentage when Griffin scores fewer than 20 points (28-14) than it does when he gets 20 or more (20-11).
— Reported by Joe Resnick of the Associated Press
