LAKE BUENA VISTA, Fla. (AP) — Kawhi Leonard and the Clippers had enough answers to withstand Luka Doncic’s dazzling debut — especially after his running mate was thrown out of the game.
Leonard had 29 points and 12 rebounds, and the Clippers got a big boost from the ejection of Kristaps Porzingis to beat the Dallas Mavericks 118-110 on Monday night in Game 1 of their Western Conference playoff series.
Doncic finished with 42 points, nine assists and seven rebounds, and had the No. 7 seed hanging right with the Clippers for much of the night.
But Los Angeles pulled into the lead when Porzingis was ejected for picking up his second technical foul in the third quarter to move ahead and Doncic couldn’t bring the Mavs all the way back.
RAPTORS 134,
NETS 110
Fred VanVleet scored 30 points and the defending NBA champion Raptors beat the Nets.
VanVleet went 8 of 10 from 3-point range and the Raptors shot 22 of 44 from beyond the arc as a team. The Raptors’ 22 3-pointers matched a season high and set a franchise playoff record.
VanVleet had 11 assists with only one turnover, becoming the first Raptor in franchise history to combine 30-plus points and 10-plus assists in a playoff game.
Serge Ibaka scored 22 points off the bench for the Raptors.
Brooklyn’s Timothe Luwawu-Cabarrot scored 26 to match a career high.
NUGGETS 135,
JAZZ 125, OT
Jamal Murray scored 10 of his 36 points in overtime on a day Donovan Mitchell erupted for a Jazz playoff-record 57 points as the Denver Nuggets outlasted Utah in Game 1 of their first-round series.
Nikola Jokic finished with 29 points and 10 rebounds for Denver. He had a chance to win it in regulation at the buzzer, but his right-handed hook shot over Utah’s Rudy Gobert was off the mark.
