LOS ANGELES – The L.A. Clippers returned to practice today for the first time in over a month, something they very much needed after a very busy March schedule. Their most recent game, a collapse of a loss to the Sacramento Kings, is still fresh on their minds two days later, and the team knows it can't afford any more bad games as the season winds down.

Up next for L.A. is the red-hot Washington Wizards, who have won the second-most games since the calendar flipped over to 2017. The biggest matchup everyone will be watching is the point guard matchup between Chris Paul and John Wall. Ahead of Wednesday night's game, Clippers' head coach Doc Rivers discussed the challenge of defending Wall and how to try and stop him. Rivers compared Wall to Westbrook, and said the key is to build a wall.

“John Wall, he’s just a one-man attack,” said Rivers. “[Russell] Westbrook does it with power and speed. Wall does it too but the speed’s even faster. So you have to, and I’m not trying to be corny, but you do have to build a wall. You can take that in a lot of ways. You can take it the [Donald] Trump way, you can take it the John Wall way. But what I mean is the John wall-way. You have to build a defensive wall so he doesn’t get in the paint.”

Paul, who is going to be defending Wall for the most part, is looking forward to the matching up with Wall and looking to avenge the mid-December loss in Washington a few months back.

“John’s been having an amazing year,” relayed Paul. “The way they play, they play so free. They’ve got John, they got [Bradley] Beal, they got one of the Morris twins and [Marcin] Gortat. All those guys they play, they know their roles. The way they’ve been playing and the way they beat us there, we need this win.”

The Clippers are fighting for playoff positioning in the tight Western Conference, so every win or loss is crucial at this point of the season.