Kawhi Leonard, James Harden get real on Clippers’ 5-13 start

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Kawhi Leonard, James Harden get real on Clippers’ 5-13 start

Tomer Azarly, ClutchPoints · ClutchPoints

Thu, Nov 27, 2025 ·

5 min read

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The post Kawhi Leonard, James Harden get real on Clippers' 5-13 start appeared first on ClutchPoints .

LOS ANGELES, CA – Kawhi Leonard , James Harden , and the LA Clippers continued to stumble in the standings as we near the quarter point of the regular season. LA dropped to 5-13 on the season following their 135-118 loss against the Los Angeles Lakers in NBA Cup play. The loss also puts a dent in the Clippers' hopes of reaching the NBA cup quarterfinals in early December.

The Clippers' lost yet another game due to the same areas that have plagued them all season: turnovers, points off turnovers, fast break points, offensive rebounds given up, and their defense.

In Tuesday's loss to the Lakers, the Clippers turned the ball over 16 times, giving up 20 points off their turnovers. They also allowed the Lakers to score 24 fast break points with 12 offensive rebounds and 11 second chance points.

"The first three quarters, I thought we played was really solid basketball," said Tyronn Lue . "Then [we saw] the things that have been hurting us. We had a couple turnovers. We were up one with the ball, had a chance to go up, [give up] a steal for a dunk, and then had a couple more of those, and then offensive rebounding. They hurt us going to the glass and us not being able to rebound the basketball. They got a lot of easy put-backs that really hurt us, especially when we had the lead, up one, and then it just kinda snowballed from there."

Luka Doncic finished with a game-high 43 points, nine rebounds, and 13 assists on the night. Austin Reaves poured in 31 points with nine rebounds and three steals, while LeBron James had 25 points, six rebounds, and six assists.

"I think we've got to start making it a little bit harder on the better offensive players on the other teams," Leonard added after the loss. "Tonight, Luka with 40. In one of the games, Jokic had 50. So I think we gotta make them pass the ball like they to do us. You see us shrink. And they're not moving, so we've got to incorporate some of that into our defense."

It was the 11th time in 40 career games against the Clippers — regular and postseason — that Doncic has scored at least 40 points against the Clippers. He averaged 32.6 points per game against the Clippers in his career, his highest scoring average against an opponent he's played at least 20 games against.

James Harden scored 29 points with five rebounds and nine assists. In his second game back from a 10-game absence with an ankle injury, Kawhi Leonard added 19 points and five rebounds. The Clippers saw all five starters reach double-figure scoring, including Kris Dunn (19 points) and John Collins (18 points). Ivica Zubac , who saw double-teams all night long without Deandre Ayton in the Lakers lineup, finished with 10 points, 10 rebounds, and four assists.

"I felt good," Leonard said regarding his health status. "Hopefully we can build some minutes because this team needs it. Probably going to have to up our minutes to get some wins, so we'll see what happens."

We're still under a quarter of the way through the NBA season, and there still remains a big chunk of the season to turn things around.

"[We just take it] one game at a time," James Harden explained. "It's simple. You can't overlook anything else. I think we showed some great signs tonight. Obviously we don't get moral victories, but we did some really good things tonight. Just continue to chip away. It's only 18 games into the season. We've got a lot of games left to where we can hit our stride. But we've dealt with literally everything you could deal with, from injuries to different lineup changes. This is Kawhi's second game back, so there will be different lineups and different rotations. We're figuring it out, but tonight was a good stepping stone for us."

The sentiment from Lue, Leonard, and Harden postgame is that, despite their frustrations, the Clippers have confidence that they can figure things out and pull their way out of this disastrous start.

"What else are we going to do?" Harden asked. "You've got confidence eery day when you wake up, right?"

Towards the end of his postgame press conference, Lue was asked how the team remains confident despite the 5-13 start that has them as the third worst team in the Western Conference.

"[We just] stay positive," Lue said. "We've been here before. We haven't been this far down, but I do have confidence in this team that we will get on track. We need a couple wins that we've got to string together and get our guys playing the ight amount of minutes and things with change. We have the right intent, doing things the right way, building our foundation on both sides of the basketball.

"Now, if we weren't putting in the work or guys didn't think we could win, then it'd be something totally different. They are, we are, the coaches are. We're looking for all the answers. we're playing young guys trying to figure it out. For me, we'll be okay. If I wasn't, I would tell you."

It's only been 18 games, so there certainly is time to figure things out. That time, however, is quickly running out.

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