Seattle 109 LA Clippers 100 Saitama Super Arena, Japan Maybe it's the food or the culture, but Flip Murray has made a real impression in his first ever NBA start. Posting 24 points on 10/17 shooting, and 4 rebounds, Murray made the temporary pain of losing Ray Allen seem like it didn't exist. Rashard Lewis, expected to finally have his big breakout year, also started well with 25, 4 and 3 while Brent Barry handled PG duties with ease, posting 9 assists along with his 19 points and 4 boards. Vladimir Radmanovic muscled inside for 13 and 11, but opponent Elton Brand won the match-up with 21, 15 and an amazing 8 blocks, the latter stat contributing significantly to Radmanovic's 6-17 shooting. Other notable performances included Calvin Booth playing one of his better games in Emerald Green, posting 8 points, 8 boards and 2 blocks in 23 minutes. Rookie Luke Ridnour played his first 19 minutes of NBA basketball, and finished with respectable numbers of 8 points, 2 rebounds, 3 assists, a steal, 2 TOs and no fouls. Boxscore here: http://www.nba.com/games/20031030/LACSEA/boxscore.html All in all a solid start to the season for Seattle, and they finish their Japanese roadtrip on Friday against LA again. Seattle led at every break, did not trail after halftime and had a monster 3rd quarter of 39 points, setting up the victory
Very impressive performance without Ray Allen..Murray played a great game didn't know he had it in him...It makes the Bucks/Sonics trade look even worse now for the bucks
Flip was drafted in the 2nd round, but the Bucks actually rated him so highly they gave him a 2 year deal with an option for a third, instead of the regulation 1 year. Kid can flat out score (Ave. 23 in summer league) but it's good to see him play a controlled game in the bigtime.
