Kawhi Leonard’s Buzzer-Beater Caps Clippers’ Wild 24-Point Comeback Over Pacers

INDIANAPOLIS – There was no reason to believe the Los Angeles Clippers were going to win this game, and honestly, nobody would have blamed you for turning it off early. 

Indiana came out firing on all cylinders in the first quarter, going 8-for-11 from three and jumping out to a 42-21 lead that eventually ballooned to 24 points. 

The Pacers looked like the team fighting for playoff positioning, not the one sitting at 16-58 with the worst record in the league.

And then something shifted.

While the first quarter was a disaster, Darius Garland refused to let this one get away. 

The former Cavalier, who has been averaging 18.9 points and 6.9 assists on the season, went to work picking apart Indiana’s defense in the second and third quarters, hitting pull-up threes and getting to the rim whenever Los Angeles needed a bucket. 

He finished with a team-high 30 points on 10-of-19 shooting and knocked down six threes on the night to go with five assists, and every single one of those makes felt like it came at a moment where the Clippers were about to lose their grip on the comeback entirely.

Bennedict Mathurin chipped in off the bench too, scoring 17 in his return to Indianapolis after being traded from the Pacers last month, and he helped spark an 8-0 run to close the first half that cut the deficit to 10 heading into the break.

By the fourth quarter the Clippers had clawed all the way back, and it became a real game. But even after all that work, it looked like it might not be enough. 

Obi Toppin buried a jumper to put Indiana up 113-108 with about a minute left, and the 16,645 fans inside Gainbridge Fieldhouse could feel a win coming.

They were wrong. 

Kawhi Leonard answered with a jumper of his own, and then Garland calmly stepped to the line and knocked down two free throws to make it a one-point game. 

Pascal Siakam missed on the other end, and the Clippers had one last chance. 

Leonard took the inbound along the left side, dribbled to the middle of the floor, rose up over two defenders and drained a mid-range jumper with just 0.4 seconds on the clock. The building went silent.

Leonard finished with 28 points, eight rebounds and four assists, and in the process became just the 14th player in NBA history to score 20 or more points in 50 straight games. 

He is averaging 28.3 points per game this season, and when asked about the game-winner afterward, Leonard was his usual calm self. 

“Just be patient," Leonard said. “Even with 5 seconds on the clock or 3 seconds, you still got a lot of time to get a shot off. Just trust your work."

 That trust has been building all season long for a guy who has talked openly about what consistency means to him and this group. 

“That’s how you build championship habits," Leonard said recently. “Just trying to win more than anything because the numbers will change." On nights like this one, there really is no better closer in basketball.

The win moves Los Angeles to 38-36, now winners of four straight, and it was also the 400th career victory for head coach Tyronn Lue. 

This is a team that started the year 6-21 and was essentially written off before Christmas. 

And look, they still have work to do with a trip to Milwaukee coming up on Sunday, but victories like this one are the kind that can change a team’s entire belief in itself heading into the stretch run.