The Los Angeles Clippers may look like a completely different team than they did before the trade deadline, but Brian Shaw believes that’s a good thing.
Shaw is best known for his long playing career, which included winning three championships with the Los Angeles Lakers led by Shaquille O’Neal and Kobe Bryant. The 59-year-old player has enjoyed a successful coaching career since retiring and has served as a Lakers assistant on two separate occasions. He has been an assistant for the Clippers since 2021.
The Clippers have clearly had difficulty enjoying postseason success in recent years despite being loaded with star power. In earlier years, they had the Kawhi Leonard-Paul George duo and more recently they had James Harden and Russell Westbrook. However, they have not been able to progress beyond the first round since Shaw’s arrival.
Los Angeles made a big move at the trade deadline, landing Harden, a 36-year-old star guard, for 26-year-old guard Darius Garland in a trade with the Cleveland Cavaliers. The Clippers entered the season with the oldest roster in the NBA at 30.7 years. Although they are much younger now, Shaw believes this will benefit the team as they look to advance to the postseason.
Los Angeles currently sits in 10th place in the Western Conference and are playing for a play-in spot. Shaw talked about what Garland brings to the table.
“Darius can guess who you know. I coached Darius at the Nike Hoop Academy when he was in high school and just his agility, his basketball IQ, he’s a great passer, and he can score. There are players on our team that will benefit from him, being able to set the table for them, but also add to the youth and the agility that we have overall.
Shaw continued, “We started this season as the oldest team in NBA history.” “When you look at the fact that we started with Chris Paul and James Harden, we had a pretty old team. We were pretty slow, so now we feel like we can compete with these younger, faster, more athletic teams that are out there.”
Garland is one of the better, more established young guards in the league. The former fifth overall pick is a two-time All-Star selection and is averaging 18.0 points and 6.9 assists per game this season.
The 26-year-old player is still recovering from a right foot sprain injury and has not yet made his debut for the Clippers. That being said, Garland – along with Leonard – has a chance to lead the Clippers back to the playoffs. They have been a much stronger team recently, with Los Angeles going 20-6 since December 20.
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