The Thunder thought they'd accomplished something Sunday by blowing a big lead in the final nine minutes, allowing the Clippers to score on 18 of 19 possessions in the process.

But the Clippers topped that their with their meltdown Tuesday night in OKC. The Clippers were the better team for most of all four of the quarters. But they had a Big Baby Davis meltdown at the end of the first quarter, giving away four easy points freely. It was a team-wide giveaway again at the end of the second quarter and the Clips didn't maximize at the end of the third quarter, either.

But that was just a warmup to blowing a 13-point lead in the final four minutes and a 7-point lead in the final 50 seconds.

It wasn't because of foul trouble or injuries. It was the Clippers' franchise player making three bonehead plays in the final 20 seconds. Before that there was some bad possessions, too, but if Chris Paul takes care of the basketball, lets himself get fouled and hits the free throws (or maybe if he misses the free throws), the Clippers are up 3-2 now instead of facing elimination.

The critical officiating call on out-of-bounds should probably have went to the Clippers for the way the rules are set up. But there should have been a foul on Matt Barnes on that play. It was understandable that Doc Rivers wasn't happy to put it mildly. His team lost out on the call in the other direction against Golden State.

This became a problem once replay was put in. NBA officials frequently give the team that was going to get a rebound the ball out of bounds even if the ball went off them if there was a ticky-tack foul on the play they don't want to call. It's always been understood.

The team that fouled is glad it didn't get a foul for its bump or push and life goes on. But with replay on the officials can't continue to call it that way. They have to report the foul because replay could overturn the correct team getting the ball.

Or better yet allow the refs in this situation to make the correct foul call off replay in the final minutes. Then Reggie Jackson would have shot two free throws after the obvious foul on Barnes. There's no hidden agenda for anyone to complain about.

The Clippers will be hard-pressed to play as good or have Kevin Durtant shoot as poorly as Tuesday night in the potential closeout Game 6. OKC is in the driver's seat for sure. But the team in the driver's seat in this series keeps running off the road. So maybe we get another Game 7.

