Clippers run out of steam in Houston

Sent from a library.

Sometimes you gotta head down to your local library to get some internet so you can cover a game. (Photo credit: Justin Russo)

Life has a funny way of making you adapt to interesting situations.

Tuesday night, while the LA Clippers (25-28) were doing battle with the Houston Rockets (33-19), a mere 1,600 miles away from Toyota Center, there I was, tucked away in the corner of my local library, hoarding WiFi in an effort to cover a basketball game.

It was absolutely not how I thought I would spend my Tuesday night. But such is the situation when your router takes a massive dump on Monday morning and they tell you the replacement won’t be there until Wednesday afternoon at the earliest.

Thus, amidst the mystery section at the local library, I watched the Clippers and Rockets throw haymakers, which ended as a 102-95 win by the Rockets.

The first 34 minutes of the game were hotly contested and played within a 10-point window, with the largest lead being a scant six points.

While I sat at a table with a slew of James Patterson novels standing at attention on their shelves just to my right, the Rockets put together a surge that the Clippers were unable to match -- an 11-0 run in roughly 90 seconds. It took over four minutes for the Clippers to make their first basket in the fourth quarter.

“I thought we played hard,” Clippers coach Tyronn Lue said postgame following the loss. “We just didn’t capitalize on a few things.”