INGLEWOOD, Calif. - The Los Angeles Clippers had this one. They had it for nearly four full quarters, and then in the span of a few minutes, they watched it all slip away.
A 13-point fourth-quarter lead at the Intuit Dome turned into a 126-121 loss to the Golden State Warriors in Wednesday night's Play-In Tournament showdown, and just like that, a season that once looked dead at 6-21 was over for good.
It was a brutal finish for a team that had spent most of the night looking like the better roster, especially after Stephen Curry buried his seventh three to break a tie with 50.4 seconds left and the Warriors closed the game on a 16-6 run.
The Collapse Down the Stretch
For most of the night, the Clippers were the better team, and they looked like it.
Bennedict Mathurin led six players in double figures with 23 points, Kawhi Leonard scored 21 before going cold late, and the Clippers built a 98-85 cushion with 9:53 to play.
Then the floor gave out.
Al Horford, somehow still draining threes at 39 years old, drilled four of them in the fourth quarter alone, and Curry poured in 27 of his 35 points in the second half once he got loose.
Leonard, who had been stellar through three quarters, went scoreless in the fourth until 16 seconds remained as Draymond Green stuck to him on 51 half-court possessions, the most by any defender in a single game this season.
Leonard also coughed up five turnovers in the second half, his most in a half since 2019, and the Clippers couldn't generate enough offense from anywhere else once Golden State sold out to take him away.
Quotes from the Locker Room
Leonard, eligible to extend his contract this summer and now staring down the final year of his deal, was asked about his future and didn't bite. "Let me cry about this loss a little bit more," he said. "We'll have our discussions when that time comes."
On Green, who locked him up in the fourth, Leonard offered respect through gritted teeth, calling him a "Hall of Fame defender" and admitting "it was hard to even get shots up."
Darius Garland, who finished with 21 points and eight assists while battling foul trouble all night before fouling out with under a minute to play, had spoken earlier in the week about facing Curry, calling it "pretty cool going against a top-75 guy like that, first ballot Hall of Famer."
Wednesday night, that experience cut the wrong way.
What Comes Next
The Clippers finished 42-40, going 36-19 after their dreadful start, the first team in NBA history to climb 15 games above .500 after sitting 15 games under it.
They'll miss the postseason for the first time since 2022, and their unprotected first-round pick now belongs to Oklahoma City.
With Leonard's future uncertain and roster questions piling up around Tyronn Lue, Steve Ballmer's group has a long offseason ahead.