Stars and Struggles

Game 4 of the Western Conference Finals was the lowest scoring game of the playoffs so far as the Suns and Clippers combined for just 164 points. Prior to tonight's game, the Clippers were averaging just under 114 points per game and the Suns were just under 110 points.

If someone hadn't watched the game and just saw the final score, they would think it was a strong defensive battle, but it honestly wasn't. There's no question that both teams did well defensively, but both teams also struggled to knock down wide open shots. The Clippers who shot 41% from 3 in the regular season and shot 16.1% in tonight's game. Phoenix shot 37.8% from 3 in the regular season and shot 20% tonight.

It goes without saying that teams will certainly struggle when their stars aren't knocking down shots as the role players feed off of them most nights and that was apparent tonight. The two best players in this series, Paul George and Devin Booker both shot poorly and fouled out. George stuffed the stat sheet with 23 points, 16 rebounds and 6 assists, but none of that mattered due to him shooting 5/20 from the field, 1/9 from 3 and 12/18 from the foul line. This isn't just a one game thing for George either, in the first 3 games, George had shooting splits of 38.7/32.4/72. He's still producing a high amount of points, but doing it inefficiently which is hurting his team. If the Clippers hope to make another miraculous comeback, it'll have to start with George being better.

When it comes to Booker, these poor performances are rather surprising. He had poor performances before (games 3 and 4 vs the Lakers) but even those games weren't this bad. Following those games, Booker had a 7 game stretch where he averaged 31.1 points, 8.9 assists and 5.3 rebounds on splits of 53.4/42.9/92.9 which all resulted in wins for Phoenix. In the last 3 games he's averaging 20 points, 3.7 rebounds, 3.3 assists and 5.7 turnovers while shooting 30.5/13.3/91.7. Phoenix has won 2 of the 3 games despite Booker underperforming, but if they hope to win a championship, he has to get back to the player he was during that 7 game stretch.

Phoenix has a chance to close out the Clippers on Monday night in their home arena and it should be a good one. The Suns are just 48 minutes away from their third NBA Finals in franchise history, but the Clippers have been down before in these playoffs and won't go down without a fight.

Will the stars shine bright in their biggest game of the season so far, or will they continue to fade away?

stats courtesy of  Basketball Reference unless stated otherwise