Starting at center for the L.A. Clippers … Serge Ibaka.
The veteran 7-footer’s presence on the floor for the opening tip of Friday’s preseason opener at Staples Center wasn’t an experiment, coach Tyronn Lue said after his squad lost the Lakers, 87-81.
Ibaka is the starter.
“Zu started the last couple years and did a great job,” the Clippers’ new coach said of Ivica Zubac, the 23-year-old big man who’d started regularly for the Clippers since being acquired from the Lakers at the trade deadline a couple seasons back, winning over fans with his progress.
“(But) just kind of seeing this team, what style of play we want to play at, right now … we went with Serge and we’ll continue to see how that looks.”
During free agency, the Clippers offered a reported two-year, $19 million deal to persuade Ibaka, 31, to leave the Toronto Raptors, where he played for three-plus seasons and won a championship with Kawhi Leonard in 2019.
Fresh off a career offensive season when he averaged 15.4 points and shot 38.5% from 3-point range, Ibaka was a three-time member of the NBA’s All Defense First Team early in his career.
He started every game he played between 2011-12 and 2017-18. Then, during the Raptors’ championship season in 2018-19, Ibaka started the season alternating starts with Jonas Valanciunas, depending on matchups, before Valanciunas was traded to Memphis for Marc Gasol, who started 19 of Toronto’s final 26 regular-season games and all of its playoff contests.
Lue allowed that there could be situations that could compel him to consider platooning his 7-footers. For now, he said, it’ll be Ibaka taking the floor with Leonard, Paul George, Patrick Beverley and Marcus Morris Sr., including at 5:30 p.m. Sunday when the Clippers and Lakers meet for another preseason game at Staples Center.
“We’re going to take a look at Serge starting,” Lue said. “Throughout the course of the season, when it unfolds, we’ll see how it shakes out. But right now Serge is the starter.”
While splitting center minutes with Montrezl Harrell, last season’s Sixth Man of the Year, Zubac was productive in relatively limited time: He averaged 8.3 points, shot 61.3% from the field and grabbed 7.5 rebounds in 18.4 minutes per game – including just 3.4 fourth-quarter minutes, when he played in the final period. That happened just 23 times last season, although Zubac, who signed a four-year, $28.5 million deal before last season, was the only Clipper to play all 72 regular-season games.
In 18.3 minutes of get-the-kinks-out basketball Friday, Zubac fumbled a few opportunities but scored four points on 2-for-6 shooting to go with 10 rebounds, including five on the offensive end.
Ibaka, as was the plan, played only eight first-half minutes and finished with six points – he made 2 of his 3 field-goal attempts, all from behind the 3-point arc – and added two rebounds and a block.
He spent the remainder of the game involved on the bench, much of the time perched on a Gatorade cooler stationed between the socially distanced stars, George and Leonard – the latter of whom also was demonstratively engaged while he was off the floor Friday, communicating with coaches and teammates alike.
The two-time NBA Finals MVP left his seat often to confer with coaches about what he was watching develop in front of them, curiosity that Lue said he appreciated.
“Just learning a new system, defensively and offensively,” Lue said. “(He) just asks a lot of questions about where guys are supposed to be defensively. Offensively, ‘Was the ball supposed to go there?’ Certain things that we’re all just trying to learn each other and putting it together, but I’m very excited that he’s in tune and he’s really engaged with what we’re trying to do moving forward.”
The feelings are mutual, to hear Leonard tell it.
“We didn’t really get into too much of our package, but (Lue has) been good so far, detailed, you know? Smart, very informative,” Leonard said. “We’re just building. He’s doing a great job with this group of guys, just talking to us, gives us feedback.
“Everybody is focused and taking the hits, if it’s bad or good, to be honest, which is the team mindset that you need. If you are getting criticized, you got to keep your head up and go to the next play and play hard.”
Same goes, one would imagine, if you’re now coming off the bench, as is Zubac – with whom Leonard wrestled playfully with during a timeout Friday, an exchange that ended with Leonard placing one of his famously large hands appreciatively on the young center’s shoulder.
Kawhi 😂 pic.twitter.com/m71CW1OMRG
— Clamp 🐻 (@clampcity_) December 12, 2020
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