The Los Angeles Clippers lost a heartbreaker to the Milwaukee Bucks by a score of 106-105. Numerous missed shots in the last few minutes of the game from Kawhi Leonard and Paul George doomed LA as Giannis Antetokounmpo led his team to victory with yet another 50-point performance, this time scoring 54. Norman Powell shined for LA but didn't get the chance to close out the game.
Powell said that he wasn't worried about the shots Leonard and George took down the stretch, according to Andrew Greif of the Los Angeles Times. In the case of Leonard, he explained that because he knows those shots are ones that he has made on several occasions previously.
Per the LA times, Powell said that he told Leonard and George that “the shots he’s missing, those are the ones that he work on. I’ve seen him make those countless times, that’s why I’m not really tripping if I get the ball or not, man. I’ve seen him make that from the corner fading, midrange to send us to the [Eastern Conference Finals]. You’ve just got to live and die with those things like that but those guys know they’re going to adjust next time they’re in that situation, I think it’s going to be a different result.”
Powell had it going in the fourth quarter and led the Clippers with 26 points overall but knows that Leonard and George are the team's stars. It's an important structure for a team to have but it may have cost them a win against the Bucks.
Leonard knows that the Clippers still have some work to do. Los Angeles is 29-26, which puts them near the top of the Western Conference but not as high as they have been shooting for.