Game Preview: Clippers v Suns

The Phoenix Suns will visit the Los Angeles Clippers at Staples Center on Monday.

The tough opening week schedule continues for the Suns (0-3), who are still in search of their first win of the season. Phoenix is coming off a 106-100 home loss to the Golden State Warriors, which followed an overtime loss to the Oklahoma City Thunder. The Suns will now face another difficult point guard matchup in Chris Paul, after seeing Russell Westbrook and Stephen Curry in back-to-back games. Eric Bledsoe and T.J. Warren got hot for the Suns in the loss against Golden State, combining for 47 points on 32 shots, while sophomore Devin Booker is still looking to get his own fire going to start the season. Booker’s lowly seven points will hurt the near 20 points per game average he had in the small two game sample size. Perimeter shooting will be key in hanging with the Clippers’ pick and roll offense led by Paul and DeAndre Jordan. Jordan’s X-rays came back negative on his sprained right thumb and should be good to go come Monday.

The Clippers (2-0) will look to continue their perfect start to the season and draw an already battle-tested Suns team at home. Again, Jordan’s aforementioned thumb injury does not look like an issue, and he will draw Tyson Chandler as a matchup. The veteran center is far from his shutdown days, defensively, but should still cause some difficulty around the rim. Los Angeles is coming off a 88-75 win against the Jazz and gets its first back-to-back of the season. Austin Rivers shined off the bench with 19 points on 8-of-11 shooting in the winning effort.

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