LA Clippers star Kawhi Leonard played 47 minutes in Sunday’s overtime win over the Golden State Warriors in the final day of the regular season. Leonard made his feelings clear on the Clippers’ playoff goals heading into their first-round matchup against Nikola Jokic and the Denver Nuggets.
Speaking to reporters after the game, Leonard was happy with his performance in the Clippers’ 124-119 win. He had 33 points, six rebounds, seven assists and three steals on 13-for-20 shooting. He’s looking forward to their series against the Nuggets, but he’s just hoping to have a healthy postseason.
“It felt good,” Leonard said, according to Clippers beat reporter Joey Linn. “I’m happy that I had a great organization behind me to allow me to get healthy and know exactly what I needed to do. Them letting me reach out to outside sources and combining together and collabbing. It’s not over yet, we still got a playoff series to try to win. Just wanna keep going from there, just have a good playoffs and have a healthy offseason and just keep going.”
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The LA Clippers needed the win to avoid falling into the NBA Play-In Tournament. They outlasted a Golden State Warriors team that had a chance to tie the game with less than 30 seconds left in overtime, but Draymond Green missed an open layup.
Kawhi Leonard and James Harden showed up for the Clippers, proving that they are a dark horse in the Western Conference. They have a hard first-round matchup against Nikola Jokic and the Denver Nuggets, but a recent turmoil in the form of firing coach Michael Malone could be helpful to the Steve Ballmer-owned franchise.
The Clippers and Nuggets had the same record of 50-32, along with the LA Lakers, but the purple and gold owned the tiebreaker. The Nuggets then owned the tiebreaker against the Clippers, though they split their season series with two wins each.
Kawhi Leonard looking to have his first healthy playoffs since 2020
The last time Kawhi Leonard had a healthy playoff run was in 2020 inside the NBA bubble. However, they failed to get out of the Western Conference semifinals after blowing a 3-1 series lead against the Denver Nuggets. His last great postseason run was in 2019 when he led the Toronto Raptors to the championship.
Leonard’s 2021 playoffs ended with a partially torn ACL that required surgery. The Clippers made their first-ever Western Conference Finals but came up short against the Phoenix Suns. The Klaw missed the entire 2021-22 season before returning the following campaign.
The Clippers made the playoffs in 2023 and 2024, but he played just two games in each year. He tore his meniscus in his right knee in 2023, while inflammation on the same knee kept him out in 2024.
alt=”Juan Paolo David” height=”72″ width=”72″>
Edited by Juan Paolo David
