Magic at Clippers
Los Angeles’ first game without star point guard Chris Paul was an utter disaster and the Clippers looks for a sharp rebound when they host the Orlando Magic on Monday. Paul will miss up to six weeks after suffering a separated shoulder on Friday and Los Angeles trailed 70-35 at halftime the next night of what turned out to be a 116-92 loss to the San Antonio Spurs. Orlando has lost three straight games but beat the Clippers earlier this season.
Paul underwent an MRI exam on Sunday and the club announced that team doctors decided he won’t need surgery. Darren Collison will be the starting point guard during Paul’s absence and the fifth-year pro with 221 career starts under his belt is averaging 8.6 points and 2.2 assists. Magic center Nikola Vucevic had missed consecutive games with an ankle injury and Orlando hopes he’s in the lineup since he had 30 points and 21 rebounds in the win over Los Angeles on Nov. 6.
TV: 10:30 p.m. ET, FSN Florida (Orlando), Prime Ticket (Los Angeles)
ABOUT THE MAGIC (10-23): Guard Arron Afflalo always gets a little extra fired up when Orlando plays in his hometown of Los Angeles. The former UCLA star scored 30 points when the Magic defeated the Clippers in Los Angeles last season and the seventh-year pro returns home with a career-best 21.2 scoring average. “I wish I could somehow mentally have that feel that I’m home every day,” Afflalo told reporters. “But the reality is that this is your job and you travel to different environments and different places. But L.A. is just a very fun place to play, even if I wasn’t from there.”
ABOUT THE CLIPPERS (23-13): Coach Doc Rivers described his squad as looking like an AAU team in the first half against the Spurs in what was a high disappointing performance. Yet power forward Blake Griffin didn’t want to hear anything about Paul’s absence playing a role. “No one to replace Chris’ anything,” Griffin said. “Not his voice, not his game, nothing. Everybody does things differently. We don’t have any other guys that talk like Chris. It’ll work just fine. In the second half, we were communicating with each other. That’s all we needed.”
BUZZER BEATERS
1. Orlando has won 11 of the last 13 meetings.
2. The Clippers committed 18 turnovers against the Spurs in their first full game without Paul.
3. The Magic are winless in six games without Vucevic this season.