Why Clippers coach Tyronn Lue becomes an ‘assassin’ during playoffs

Crucial day of the Clippers’ 2021 postseason at first regarded like something however a breakthrough.

It regarded like a damaged tv.

Inside a downtown Dallas lodge the morning of Could 28, the Clippers gathered to overview their two losses to start out a best-of-seven, first-round sequence. Besides the movie session ended abruptly. Incensed from studying Mavericks star Luka Doncic describe himself as having “enjoyable” whereas main Dallas to 2 wins in Los Angeles, one assistant pissed off by the Clippers’ lack of resistance smacked the display laborious sufficient to crack it.

The image remained fuzzy at shoot-around later that morning inside Dallas’ American Airways Middle. Hours earlier than Sport 3, gamers couldn’t get on the identical web page, forgetting the sport plan’s particulars and course. Had coaches stated to drag in defensively? When precisely ought to they rotate to assist, once more?

That evening, throughout the recreation’s first eight minutes the Clippers trailed by 19 factors as the group howled whereas a 3-0 sequence gap, a second postseason collapse in eight months and an unsure future loomed.

“We’re in a panic, that’s how you’re feeling,” guard Reggie Jackson stated. “… I’m like, I don’t need to say something however guys, if we lose as we speak each commerce, something — it’s all blown up.”

Amid Dallas’ onslaught Tyronn Lue, in his first season because the Clippers’ coach, known as two timeouts, his purpose to reassure his gamers as a lot as draw the proper set or scheme.

“I feel that was enormous for our workforce and it was enormous for me only for these guys to see within the second, how would I deal with that state of affairs?” Lue stated.

He dealt with it, Jackson stated, by strolling in telling a joke.

“And it was like, yo, do you not perceive the magnitude of the second?” Jackson stated. “He’s like, ‘Yeah, it’s simply basketball.’

“He made certain that we felt assured within the work we’d carried out all 12 months. It’s extra reassuring like rattling, you actually made us all really feel like there was no approach we weren’t going to return again.”

It was the Clippers’ clearest view of a 44-year-old coach comfy amid the crucible of postseason basketball, a risky, hyper-competitive, high-pressure setting Lue as soon as described as his “blissful place.” It’s a place the Clippers discover themselves once more following a play-in match loss Tuesday in Minnesota that units up a win-or-else recreation Friday in opposition to New Orleans. Based mostly on their belief of their coach and his monitor file, they like their probabilities.

In Cleveland, Lue turned the third coach in NBA historical past to look in three consecutive Finals in his first three seasons, and final season’s Clippers turned the primary workforce to rally from 2-0 holes in consecutive playoff sequence, even after shedding star Kawhi Leonard to damage within the convention semifinals.

Gamers and friends say every run was pushed not solely by star energy, however the best way the coach issued challenges, instilled perception, adjusted on the fly and stayed composed.

“Within the playoffs,” stated Larry Drew, the Clippers assistant who has identified Lue since his rookie NBA season in 1998, “he positively turns into an murderer.”

Channing Frye, the Turner Sports activities analyst who received a championship in Cleveland, known as Lue “essentially the most underrated coach within the league.”

Lue might make a case at being essentially the most assured his workforce will wriggle out of holes of their very own making. When he sat down in huddles in the course of the Dallas sequence, he stated his expression wasn’t a masks to cover his roiling feelings however a mirrored image of his real perception the Clippers had been on the verge of a breakthrough, not catastrophe.

“The factor about me is I’m not afraid to strive something, so I don’t care what individuals write or what they are saying as a result of I don’t learn it anyway,” Lue stated. “Crucial factor is no matter it takes for our workforce to win, that’s what I’m attempting to do.

“This time of the season is nearly winners and profitable and doing no matter it takes to win, and that’s the factor I like essentially the most concerning the playoffs.”

As soon as throughout a summertime go to to Lue’s hometown of Mexico, Mo., certainly one of Lue’s associates since highschool, Terry Nooner, heard a pal of Lue’s grandmother speaking trash over a recreation of playing cards.

The factor about it, Nooner stated, was that it wasn’t out of the unusual.

Mexico is an 11,000-person “trash-talking, assured city of people that assume they’re the most effective at all the pieces,” he stated. Lue’s childhood performed out in opposition to a backing monitor of challenges, one-liners and wisecracks from pick-up video games at Garfield Park to household outings.

“In case you don’t have robust pores and skin in Mexico you possibly can’t survive,” Lue stated.

It’s why he tosses out one-liners to coaches, gamers and reporters, and the rationale he has by no means let what others consider him affect his selections. Like when he dominated following a transfer to a Kansas Metropolis suburb after listening to a pal’s mum or dad doubt his potential to succeed at a bigger faculty. Or when Nebraska’s upperclassmen tried to boycott their coach whereas Lue, only a freshman, defied them and stored attending observe.

Clippers coach Tyronn Lue talks to up-and-coming gamers Brandon Boston Jr., left, and Amir Coffey throughout a recreation in opposition to the Suns in Phoenix this season.

(Rick Scuteri / Related Press)

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When Lue performed in Atlanta, Hawks coaches usually agreed to play him, as a reserve, in crunch-time moments as a result of “he didn’t draw back from the second, he lived for the second,” Drew stated. “That’s how he was and he coaches the identical approach.”

That childhood instilled a fearlessness to belief his instincts. He doesn’t take dangers in teaching “to be cute,” he stated. If he sees a bonus, and it aligns together with his perception and philosophy, he goes all-in.

“In case you truthfully say that you simply left all the pieces on the ground as a participant, as a coach you probably did all the pieces you might do to win that sequence or win that recreation, and it doesn’t occur then I imply, that’s it,” Lue stated. “There’s nothing you are able to do about it, they had been higher. That’s form of how I dwell my life is identical approach.”

Tom Thibodeau, the New York coach who taught Lue tips on how to analyze defensive movie when he broke into teaching, remembers Lue as a “gambler” throughout his 11-year profession as some extent guard. Frye likened Lue as a coach to a chess participant sacrificing a lesser piece to edge nearer to checkmate. On workforce flights, Clippers gamers detest dealing with Lue in Bourré, the staple of NBA card video games, for a similar causes they reply to his teaching — he’s tough to rattle, his subsequent transfer tough to learn, his enjoyment growing with the stakes.

Some individuals take their thoughts off work by {golfing}. Lue goes to his Las Vegas dwelling and gambles.

“He is aware of what you bought earlier than you do,” middle Ivica Zubac stated. “His Bourré recreation is loopy.”

“I’m the most effective,” Lue stated, and such anticipation and unpredictability have turn out to be dependable hallmarks of his teaching.

In 2016, one playoff recreation after LeBron James, Kyrie Irving and Kevin Love mixed for 89 of Cleveland’s 117 factors, Lue benched Irving and Like to spark a 26-point comeback to beat Indiana. He as soon as inserted little-used gamers comparable to Dahntay Jones and Mo Williams into massive moments within the Finals.

Tyronn Lue talks with Cavaliers star LeBron James throughout Sport 3 of the 2016 NBA Finals.

(Tony Dejak / Related Press)

Throughout a playoff sequence in opposition to Toronto, Lue used only one offensive play for a complete quarter, Frye recalled, its effectiveness tied to secrecy. Lue had run it a couple of times your entire season whereas engaged on it throughout observe, holding it in reserve as a shock.

“Which was nuts,” Frye stated. “They’d by no means actually seen it, nor did they’ve time to arrange.”

Final Could, Lue parked starter Patrick Beverley on the finish of the bench for a lot of the first-round sequence in opposition to Dallas when he was ineffective guarding Doncic, solely to make Beverley a key piece of their comeback to beat Utah the next spherical. Zubac, one other starter, was dropped at instances in favor of smaller lineups in opposition to Dallas and Utah.

“He’s going to do what he thinks is finest for the workforce, it doesn’t matter what, if which means sitting somebody for the entire sequence or one recreation or no matter, he’s going to do it,” Zubac stated. “If it doesn’t work out he tried. I like that angle. Generally it was on the expense of me, and I don’t care.”

Within the postseason, when rotations normally shrink, Lue’s mixing and matching led to a dozen Clippers incomes key minutes over the course of three sequence final season.

To Frye, that willingness to alter is an indication Lue is “not an ego coach” who tries to suit each roster to 1 system. To Lue, it’s the one approach he is aware of tips on how to function.

Lue left Mexico with greater than thick pores and skin. There are the recollections of his mom, Kim, as she raised three youngsters, and the saying she and his grandmother, Olivia, used to repeat. Be a giver, not a taker.

“I do know what it takes to outlive, however it’s moreso about serving to different individuals,” he stated. “I all the time ask myself, would you relatively be the individual asking, or the individual giving?”

Lue helped ship Cleveland’s first NBA championship, and pictures from its ensuing parade and White Home reception grasp on his workplace partitions on the Clippers’ observe facility. Now he desires to offer the Clippers the identical. They’re anticipated to be among the many betting favorites to take action in 2023 after Kawhi Leonard’s full return following a knee damage final June.

“The most important factor for me is I need to win for [Paul George], win for this group, for Mr. [Steve] Ballmer and the Clippers,” he stated. “That’s what it’s all about.”

To get there, he has employed the identical techniques he utilized in Cleveland. That usually means issuing challenges, hoping it’s going to instill a fearlessness he is aware of shouldn’t be common.

Lue took be aware of as Lakers coach Phil Jackson held stars Kobe Bryant and Shaquille O’Neal accountable throughout movie periods throughout their two championships seasons collectively. Lue has not lower stars slack as a coach, both. He went at LeBron James throughout a timeout amid Sport 7 of the 2016 Finals, exhorting him for much more effort.

“Generally you’ve acquired to mild a fireplace, generally that fireside burns the fitting approach, generally it doesn’t, however you can’t be afraid to roll the cube and burn that fireside,” Drew stated. “He has a really feel for it that I haven’t seen a number of coaches have.”

Final Could, sensing confusion because the Clippers went to interrupt the huddle and end shoot-around, Lue ordered it began over.

Clippers coach Tyronn Lue, left, and ahead Marcus Morris Sr. (8) focus on a play throughout a break in play.

(Phelan M. Ebenhack / Related Press)

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When the second session was over, Lue pulled Leonard and George over to a different monitor queued up with movie clips to point out them the sport plan had been constant all alongside. Now it was about gamers following it.

“He mainly stated it’s not concerning the teaching, it’s not about Xs and Os, it’s about us going on the market and enjoying and defending how we’re imagined to,” ahead Marcus Morris Sr. stated.

But eight months after the Clippers had surrendered a 3-1 lead within the second spherical, an embarrassing exit that led to Doc Rivers’ ouster and Lue’s promotion, Lue wished to know one thing extra elemental earlier than Sport 3 in Dallas.

“The most important factor is, do you consider we are able to win?” Lue stated. “In case you don’t let’s simply go dwelling now.”

He acknowledged the numerous strain on the workforce for the time being. He stated, “if I lived up to now I wouldn’t be right here. What occurred within the bubble and no matter, it’s what it’s. You’ll be able to’t return and alter that. All you are able to do now could be keep within the second now and do one thing particular right here and so I give credit score to the fellows.

“They locked in, they believed in what we had been doing after which we had been capable of execute it.”

Generally as late as 2:30 a.m., Clippers assistants have turn out to be used to the ping of their telephones.

The messages are from Lue, an evening owl who prepares higher amid the late-night quiet. He works generally till 4 a.m.

In June 2016, after the Cavaliers had fallen behind 2-0 in the course of the Finals, it was the ring of a buzzer in Drew’s high-rise Cleveland condo that startled him round 9 p.m. Lue was on the entrance desk.

“He says, ‘Hey, let’s go take a stroll,’” Drew stated. “We went strolling in downtown Cleveland on an attractive evening. We simply went strolling for about three hours. I acquired again and my shirt was simply drenched.”

“Do you see something we are able to do?” Lue requested Drew. “Is there something that I’m doing improper?”

Tyronn Lue, with pal and assistant coach Larry Drew to his proper, hoists Jap Convention trophy after beating Boston in 2018.

(Elise Amendola / Related Press)

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Lue’s postseason success can obscure what he overtly acknowledges: He doesn’t all the time have the solutions or maintain the playing cards. What he’ll all the time present, gamers say, is perception.

“He’s so assured it’s going to work,” stated Jackson, who confronted Lue as a first-round opponent in 2016 with Detroit and far prefers being on the identical facet of the coach voted the most effective at in-game changes final September by NBA normal managers.

“Me, I’m scared like, ‘If it doesn’t work, what’s the counter?’ And he’s like, ‘There isn’t a counter. It’s going to work.’ So while you see it occur it’s like oh, snap.”

As he informed Drew on their stroll, the strain was on Golden State.

“He made certain that we felt assured within the work we’d carried out all 12 months,” Jackson stated of the Dallas comeback. “It’s extra reassuring like, rattling, you actually made us all really feel like there was no approach we weren’t going to return again.”

To begin Cleveland’s first comeback from a 3-1 deficit in finals historical past, Lue confirmed movie solely after Cavaliers wins, as a substitute of losses, to strengthen positivity than errors, recognizing his workforce might be mentally fragile. The changes Lue made, comparable to not switching Golden State’s break up cuts, had been carried out to simplify their plan and restrict how a lot his workforce needed to assume.

Earlier than the championship trophy ceremony in Oakland, Lue and Drew caught one another’s consideration on reverse ends of the stage.

“We simply began strolling towards one another and we each simply misplaced it,” Drew stated. “We hugged, man. He calls me Blue. He’s crying, I’m crying, he goes, ‘Blue you had been so proper, Blue. You stated keep the course, we stayed the course. We stayed the course.’ It was touching. He’s that form of a coach who simply has, there’s a continuing will to push by robust instances, push by unhealthy instances and never succumb. He received’t let his groups do this.”

Tuesday’s loss in Minnesota has turned Friday into a very powerful day of the Clippers’ season. Their place is unenviable, the issue of their highway to repeat final season’s run plain, the postseason strain apparent.

As is the supply of their perception.

It appears rather a lot like Lue.