The Clippers were prepared for Jokić’s magic. They were braced for Murray’s step-backs. The team was ready for Denver’s off-ball movement, for the high-post trickery, for the grinding, methodical style that had buried them earlier. They were ready for everything — except an airball. And that’s where heartbreak found them.

For three quarters, Los Angeles teetered between chaos and control, unable to impose their will. They clawed back from a 22-point crater, sparked by James Harden’s fury, Ivica Zubac’s backbone, and Norman Powell’s urgency. They tied it at 99, swung the momentum in their favor. One stop — that was all they needed.

Instead, as Nikola Jokić’s desperate fadeaway fluttered harmlessly past the rim, the Clippers froze. They watched, rooted to the floor, as Aaron Gordon crashed from nowhere, elevated early, and hammered the put-back home. The red lights flashed. The replay lingered. The Intuit Dome held its breath. Good basket. Nuggets win. Series tied.

Inside a stunned Clippers locker room, Ty Lue’s voice cut through the silence, not with anger, but with clarity. “They picked up their pressure. They sped us up,” Lue said. “We didn’t meet their intensity until the fourth quarter. That’s a lesson for us: stay the course. Execute. Don’t get bored with the process.”

This wasn’t a night stolen by Denver’s brilliance. It was surrendered by the Clippers’ lapses — the simplest, cruelest lapse of all: forget the fundamentals, and the game forgets you. Ty Lue wasn’t just frustrated after the final horn. He was clear-eyed, almost surgical. This wasn’t about schemes or luck or referees. This was about the Clippers forgetting, for too long, who they needed to be.

“Our mentality is simple: we know how we need to play, we know the blueprint — now we just have to go out and do it,” Lue said, voice rising ever so slightly. “It’s 2-2 now. They’re a really good team — a championship team — and they’re not just going to give in. We have to beat them, and that’s okay. We’ll go to Denver on Tuesday. It’s not really about coming up with a whole new game plan — it’s about approaching it with a new mindset, understanding exactly what we need to do, and executing it with discipline.”

The message wasn’t subtle. The film would show it all anyway — how easily Denver sped them up, how scattered the Clippers looked in the second quarter, how empty some of their possessions became when the initial action didn’t work. It wasn’t until desperation cornered them that the real Clippers emerged: sharp rotations, quick reads, poised decisions under pressure. That team? That team could beat Denver.

But the version that drifted through the first three quarters? That team would watch this series slip away without ever truly forcing the issue. Lue knows the gap isn’t talent. And if they don’t find it now in Denver’s building under the glare of playoff pressure, they never will!

Game 5 will be a battle of wills, not schemes

The truth is, Denver didn’t outclass the Clippers in Game 4. They just outlasted them. Barely. You could see the cracks in the Nuggets’ armor even as Aaron Gordon sprinted away in celebration. Michael Porter Jr. is clutching his shoulder after every movement. Nikola Jokić is laboring through heavy legs after another 40-minute burden. David Adelman’s post-game smile — more relief than triumph.

Denver is not invincible. They’re surviving. And the Clippers — if they were listening in that locker room, if they truly heard Ty Lue’s words — should understand exactly what opportunity still lies in front of them. But opportunity is nothing without urgency. It won’t be enough to chase the game again. It won’t be enough to mount a furious rally when the clock becomes an enemy. The standard has to rise from the opening tip.

That’s what Lue meant when he talked about discipline. Not some coach-speak cliché. Real discipline — the kind that shows up possession after possession, screen after screen, when no crowd is roaring, no adrenaline is pumping, no scoreboard is flashing red.

This points out towards one thing: Trust the reads. Trust the rotations. Trust the plan, even when it feels boring. Especially when it feels boring.

Because Denver will test their patience again. They will bait them into shortcuts. They will tempt them into playing for the highlight instead of the win. And if the Clippers — even for one quarter, one stretch, one crucial sequence — lose that focus, they will watch the Nuggets slip through their hands again.

The blueprint exists. Lue knows it. In fact, he’s seen it before — back in 2016, when a Cavaliers team teetering on the brink refused to blink against Golden State. He’s seen it in 2021, when a battered Clippers squad ground out two straight wins against the Jazz without Kawhi Leonard. And now, he’s daring this group to do it again.

The real Clippers, the ones who stormed back in the fourth quarter with fury and precision, can seize this series. But the question that has haunted this team for years — will they? — still lingers. Game 5 won’t be decided by play-calling. It will be decided by will. By toughness. By discipline under fire.

The Clippers have the talent. They have the experience. What they don’t have — not yet — is the proof. And next time the ball is in the air, in Denver’s building, in the chaos of another playoff battle, it won’t be about luck. It’ll be about who wants it more — and whether the Clippers are finally ready to want it enough.