LOS ANGELES — On this Saturday night, the city of Los Angeles belonged to the Clippers and not the Lakers.
And the brand new guard in L.A., the Clippers’ Chris Paul, was just as masterful as the five-time champion from the Lakers, Kobe Bryant.
It was Paul’s team that pulled out an impressive 102-94 victory over Bryant’s Lakers at Staples Center, in a Clippers home game in the arena the teams share.
Paul scored to give the Clippers a 95-82 lead and then limped to the bench with a strained left hamstring with 4:01 to play, never to return.
But he finished with 33 points on 12-for-22 shooting, plus six assists.
“I don’t know what happened; I thought it was a cramp,” Paul said. “I’ve never had this before. I’ll just have to wait to see tomorrow what exactly is going on.”
Bryant had had 42 points on 14-for-28 shooting, and seven rebounds.
It was Bryant’s fourth consecutive game scoring 40 points or more, his longest such streak since he had 40-plus points in five consecutive games March 16-25, 2007.
“He’s always in the attack mode,” Clippers coach Vinny Del Negro said before the game. “We’ll just try to do the best we can. But it’ll be a team defense. It won’t just be one guy.”
Blake Griffin scored 22 points and 14 rebounds, and Chauncey Billups added 19 for the Clippers.
SLAM DUNKS
Rough start: The Boston Celtics are struggling in this condensed season, and whispers are already mounting that maybe age is finally catching up with them. They dropped their fourth in a row Saturday to fall to 4-7 after 11 games. Of greater concern might be Paul Pierce, who looks to have rushed back from a heel injury before he was ready. Pierce isn’t panicking, but he concedes the heel isn’t right and might not be for a while.
Rookie watch: In a year when the draft class was projected to be worse than normal, only the Cavs’ Kyrie Irving is a consistent starter among the 30 players who were selected in the first round. Just three weeks into the season, he is an early favorite for Rookie of the Year, although Bobcats’ rookie guard Kemba Walker made his first NBA start Saturday and scored a career-high 23 points.
Pay up, Kobe: Kobe Bryant’s divorce could cost him more than $75 million, legal experts told the Los Angeles Times last week. The marriage lasted 10 years, which under California law means Vanessa Bryant is entitled to half of Bryant’s fortune in order to maintain her standard of living.
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