Big Zu lived up to his moniker Sunday night in Houston.
Ivica Zubac had 14 points, a season-high 15 rebounds – and a career-high six blocks, the last of which, on a soaring Christian Wood, was credited after a successful coach’s challenge with 16.1 seconds left and went a long way to securing the Clippers’ 99-98 victory.
“I knew it was clean, coaches trusted me and we got the win,” the Clippers’ center said on Bally Sports immediately after the game. “It was a tough game, but guys were locked in and we were good defensively.”
The Rockets were forced to foul to stop the clock after that, and the Clippers made two of them – enough to escape with the one-point victory.
Zubac was a nonfactor in the victory over the Lakers on Friday, when he finished with six point and seven rebounds and getting beaten early and often by Dwight Howard.
Two nights later, before a crowd of 14,324 at Toyota Center in Houston, the Croatian big man delivered a most memorable performance, recording his 17th double double of the season, and his fourth in the past six games.
The Clippers (32-31) won for the fifth time in six games after emerging from a three-game losing skid and managed to poke their heads above .500 for the first time since they were 19-18 following their big win in Brooklyn on Jan. 1.
Mired in the second season of a rebuild, the Rockets (15-45) continued their pursuit for the worst record in the NBA – and, potentially, the top pick in the 2022 draft that could come with it – by losing their ninth consecutive game Sunday (and their ninth in a row at home).
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Houston is 1-13 since it won consecutive games in mid-January and came into play just one game ahead of Orlando and Detroit for fewest wins in the NBA.
The Clippers fell behind by as many as 13 points in the first half, but trailed by just four at the break. Hartenstein was a sparkplug off the bench in the opening half, with 10 points on 5-for-5 shooting and two blocks in his first seven minutes.
And Terance Mann had an impassioned late-first-half push, with seven points and six rebounds in the second quarter.
In a teeter-totter third quarter, Zubac patrolled the rim effectively with a couple of blocks and a few more contests.
And Reggie Jackson got going in the third with nine of his team-high 26 points – but the Clippers’ deficit grew to six points – 80-74 – entering the fourth quarter.
In the final period, Luke Kennard – who’d shot 8 for 9 from 3-point range in the Clippers’ 142-111 victory over Houston on Feb. 17 – hit his first and only shot of the night – a 3-pointer that gave the Clippers an 84-83 lead and served as an exclamation point on a 10-0 run, triggering a Houston timeout.
Amir Coffey scored seven of his nine points in the fourth quarter to help put away the host Rockets, whom the Clippers will face again Tuesday.
More to come on this story.