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PLAYA VISTA, Calif. – Los Angeles Clippers forward Blake Griffin is used to getting hard fouls during the regular season and fully expects more of the same once the playoffs start on Sunday against the Memphis Grizzlies.

“I heard it gets a lot more physical,” Griffin said with a smile after practice Friday. “We’ll see. I have to keep an open mind and get a feel for the first game… If it gets any more [physical] I might not make it. I know it’s going to be physical but I can’t imagine it getting a whole lot more physical than it’s been but I’m ready for that.”

This week Los Angeles Lakers guard Kobe Bryant said Griffin should hit back if the hard fouls continue in the postseason.

“I'd smack the f--- out of somebody,” Bryant told ESPNLosAngeles.com on Wednesday. “I've known him for a while and he's a really nice guy so I don't know if he'd want to do that. But I would. I would've done it early in the year.”

Griffin understood what Bryant meant but said the playoffs weren’t the right time to retaliate.

“Now’s not the right time,” Griffin said. “Going into the playoffs we need everyone on the floor. We can’t give up stupid points as far of technical fouls or flagrant fouls or something like that. You just have to keep your composure whenever something like that happens.”

Whatever chances the Los Angeles Clippers had of ruffling the feathers of the Los Angeles Lakers by hanging a Pacific Division championship banner up at Staples Center likely died Thursday in Phoenix.

The Suns’ 93-90 win over the Clippers not only kept the Suns’ playoff hopes alive but probably ended any hopes the Clippers had of overtaking the Lakers for the Pacific title. The Lakers are now one game up with the tie-breaker in-hand so the Clippers would essentially have to make up two games with only three games left in the season.

Stranger things have happened but with Kobe Bryant coming back for the Lakers on Friday and the Clippers finishing the season with back-to-back games on the road against the playoff-bound Atlanta Hawks and New York Knicks, it doesn’t look likely.

Now, Lakers fans may still be scoffing at the notion that the Clippers would dare hang up a banner as meaningless as a Pacific Division title at Staples Center but they may have missed the fact that the Los Angeles Kings, who haven’t won Stanley Cup, have a division and conference championship banner hanging up in the rafters.

The Clippers have been itching for any reason to hang up a banner, a jersey, anything at Staples Center since 1999 and this was their chance, whether the Lakers’ fans think its legitimate or not.

Although the Clippers probably won’t overtake the Lakers in the Pacific this season, Chris Paul has changed the culture surrounding the Clippers so much that it’s impossible not to hear a Buffalo Braves reference during a Clippers game or read it in a story this season because you really do have to go all the way back to the Braves to find a time when the franchise was this good.

Not only have the Clippers won 13 of 16 games but they have are 16-15 on the road this season and are attempting to finish the season with a .500 or better road record for the first time since moving to Los Angeles in 1984.

This season Paul has helped the Clippers end long road losing streaks in Denver (9 straight losses), Utah (16), Orlando (9), San Antonio (17), Dallas (10) and nearly added Phoenix to the list, but will have to wait until next season to snap a losing streak that hit 10 on Thursday.

With their next win, the Clippers will clinch the best winning percentage in franchise history which was previously held by, you guessed it, the 1974-75 Buffalo Braves (.598). It would also go a long way in clinching the No. 4 seed in the West, which would give the Clippers home court advantage in the first round of the playoffs, likely against the Memphis Grizzlies

All the numbers and statistics the Clippers have put up this season, however, can’t replicate or make up for the fact that many key players on the Clippers such as Blake Griffin, DeAndre Jordan, Randy Foye and Eric Bledsoe have no playoff experience. Thursday’s game in Phoenix, however, was a perfect example of the kind of playoff atmosphere and intensity they will face next month.

“The playoffs are a whole different level,” Del Negro said this week. “It will be different for some of the guys that haven't been through it. Guys think they're ready, but they're not. It will be a different level.”

The biggest lesson Paul said he will try to instill in his teammates about the playoffs is having a short memory. Every win and every loss should be forgotten the moment the game is over until one team accumulates four wins. With three games left in the season, the Clippers have already had the greatest regular season in franchise history, but Paul knows all of that will be about as meaningless as a Pacific Division championship banner in Los Angeles once the playoffs finally start.

Barring a catastrophic late season collapse, the Los Angeles Clippers should return to the playoffs for the first time since the 2005-2006 season. Making the postseason will be an important step for a franchise that’s seen the playoffs just four times in 28 seasons in Los Angeles, but the Clippers could stand do some damage in their return. With Blake Griffin and Chris Paul’s contracts coming up relatively soon (not to mention Vinny Del Negro’s), the Clippers need to put up a good showing in the playoffs to keep the vultures from swarming.

Although the Clippers don’t follow the mold of your traditional contender due to their lackluster defense (20th in defensive efficiency), they are a team with very specific strengths that could overwhelm an opponent in the right matchup. Although their first round draw will likely be out of their hands, here’s what the Clippers should be rooting for as the Western Conference playoff picture shakes out.

Pick-and-Roll

It’s the bread-and-butter play for the Clippers, and despite its predictability, defenses as a whole have failed to stop it with any sort of consistency. The Clippers rank first in the league in points per possession (PPP) on shots the ballhandler takes in the pick-and-roll, while Paul ranks sixth among all players. Point being, if Paul gets a favorable switch or the space to operate coming off a screen, he’s one of the best point producers in the league.

To properly blow up a pick-and-roll, you need to have mobile, intelligent big men. The Lakers are a perfect example of this. Pau Gasol is one of the best in the business at showing hard on a screen, then recovering properly. He’s a big reason the Lakers rank 9th in pick-and-roll ballhandler defense, even with the molasses-like duo of Derek Fisher and Steve Blake covering the ball most of the year.

Although they probably won’t meet in the first round, offensively the Clippers would love a matchup against the San Antonio Spurs, who rank as the league’s worst defensive team in PPP allowed to ballhandlers in the pick-and-roll. The Spurs have immobile bigs and lack the ability to switch their bigs on to guards -- a huge reason why the previous meetings between these two teams have been so high scoring.

If the regular season has been any indicator, the Clippers are going to rely heavily on Paul’s scoring and the pick-and-roll come playoff time. As long as they avoid the Dallas Mavericks (2nd in the league) and the Lakers, they should be able to ride that play to plenty of success.

Best case: San Antonio Spurs, Houston Rockets, Utah Jazz
Worst case: Dallas Mavericks, Los Angeles Lakers, Oklahoma City Thunder

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Clippers (32-21) vs. Los Angeles Lakers (34-20) at Staples Center, 7:30 p.m. PT

Five storylines to track:

1. They’re streaking: Maybe Vinny Del Negro should be on the hot seat more often. After Del Negro's job security was reportedly in doubt after the Clippers lost three games in three days, the Clippers have won six straight for the first time in 20 years. The Clippers’ 94-75 win over the Dallas Mavericks on Monday gave the Clippers their first six-game winning streak since March 18-31, 1992. It is the longest time in NBA history between winning streaks of more than five times. The previous longest drought was over 12 years, by the Denver Nuggets, between January 1991 and December 2003. The longest winning streak in franchise history is 11 games from Nov. 3-23, 1974 when the Clippers were the Buffalo Braves. Since relocating to Los Angeles in 1984, the Clippers have had just three winning streaks of six games or longer. The Clippers' longest winning streak in Los Angeles was eight games from Nov. 30-Dec.15, 1991.

2. Foye on fire: Clippers guard Randy Foye tied a franchise-record for most 3-pointers made in a game against the Mavericks on Monday when he hit eight three-pointers, going 8-of-15 from beyond the arc. Foye finished with a season-high 28 points on 10-of-19 shooting from the field. In the last three games, Foye has been averaging 21.6 points and 3.3 assists while shooting 57 percent (27-of-47) from the field, 48.4 percent (16-of-33) from three-point range and is also 5-of-5 from the free-throw line. Foye has improved his play in the absence of Mo Williams, who also had a big game from beyond the arc this season when he hit seven three-pointers in the Clippers’ win over San Antonio last month.

3. Big games: The Clippers have been one of the best teams this season against good teams. The Clippers are 19-12 this season against teams at or above .500. Their .613 win percentage against such teams is the fifth-highest in the NBA this season. The Clippers have also won four of the last five meetings with the Lakers as the home team. That is the Clippers’ best five-game stretch at home in the all-time series since both teams moved into the Staples Center entering the 1999-2000 season. The Clippers and Lakers have split their two games this season, with the home team winning each game. The Clippers won both times the teams played this preseason.

4. Lob City: Despite getting grief for the nickname, the Clippers have lived up to the “Lob City” tag this season. They’ve recorded 82 alley-oop dunks this season, most in the NBA, followed by the Lakers with 70 and the Knicks with 59. The Clippers also have recorded the most dunks this season with 318. The Clippers have two of the top three dunkers in the NBA as Blake Griffin leads the league with 155 dunks and DeAndre Jordan is third with 116. Lakers center Andrew Bynum is fourth with 115 dunks this season while Pau Gasol is 13th with 65 dunks.

5. Playoff push: Wednesday’s game between the Clippers and Lakers will go a long way in deciding which team will win the Pacific Division this season. A Lakers win would give them a 2.5-game lead on the Clippers plus the head-to-head tiebreaker, while a Clippers win would move the Clippers within a half game of the Lakers and give the Clippers the head-to-head tiebreaker. The winner of the Pacific Division will likely get the third seed in the West behind the Oklahoma City Thunder and the San Antonio Spurs and avoid playing the Thunder until the Conference Finals. As it stands now the Lakers would play the Mavericks and the Clippers would play the Grizzlies in the first round of the playoffs if the season ended today.

LOS ANGELES -- Even though Chauncey Billups was lost for the season 39 days ago, the thought of the Los Angeles Clippers possibly trading for a replacement in Nick Young wasn’t hatched until 10 days ago.

It was a deal the Clippers, in need of a big shooting guard, wanted to make. And it was a trade Young, a Los Angeles native who played at Cleveland High (in nearby Reseda) and USC, wanted the Clippers to make.

In the end, however, it seemed as though it wasn’t going to happen. As much as Clippers general manager Neil Olshey coveted Young and thought he could help the team, he wasn’t prepared to part with any of the assets he wanted to protect currently and in the future. Those assets included second-year guard Eric Bledsoe, future first-round picks and players currently ingrained in the rotation, such as guards Mo Williams and Randy Foye.

As of 11:15 a.m. in Los Angeles, Olshey was ready to move forward with the Clippers’ roster before he got a phone call from Washington Wizards general manager Ernie Grunfeld. The Clippers were back in the mix if they wanted Young, and the price tag was more than reasonable. They could get their talented 26-year-old starting shooting guard, and all the Clippers had to give up was a future second-round pick, which they got from the New Orleans Hornets in the Chris Paul trade, and Brian Cook, who has played all of 16 games this season, averaging 1.9 points and 1.4 rebounds.

Basically the Clippers were getting Young, who is averaging 16.6 points and 2.4 rebounds in 32 starts this season, for nothing to complete a larger three-team deal between the Wizards and Denver Nuggets that sent Nene Hilario to the Wizards and JaVale McGee and Ronny Turiaf to the Nuggets.

“I was actually surprised, I didn’t think there was any way we were going to be able to acquire a player like Nick Young for a future second-round pick,” Olshey said. “Nick has wanted to be here for a long time. He was motivated to come here. Clearly, it was part of a bigger deal and we needed to make the math work for Washington and Denver to complete their transitions.”

Olshey said he thought the deal was dead last night when he went to bed and anticipated the Clippers would not make any deals. That is, until 45 minutes before the NBA trade deadline, when Grunfeld called him. Olshey had already informed Clippers owner Donald Sterling about the prospect of the deal Wednesday night and Sterling had signed off on it.

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LOS ANGELES -- In a city where imitation isn’t so much a form of flattery but simply par for the course, it made sense that Chris Paul would sport the same clear protective mask Kobe Bryant has made famous during the past two weeks.

Much like Prada shoes, Gucci bags and Louis Vuitton purses, you can just imagine clear masks sprouting up all over Rodeo Drive in the coming days.

Until the Clippers learn how to win close games, however, Paul’s mask and the rest of the Clippers will always be viewed as knockoffs in this town.

While Bryant and his mask are 4-0 at Staples Center, Paul’s mask debuted with a 97-93 loss to the Golden State Warriors on Sunday night. The Clippers are now 4-7 in their last 11 games and haven’t won back-to-back games in a month.

The Clippers will wake up Monday morning for the first time since the first week of the season and find themselves in second place in the Pacific Division behind the Lakers. It has been a familiar reality for the Clippers for the past 30 years but it wasn’t supposed to be that way this season.

This season was supposed to be different because Paul was supposed to be different. The Clippers have never had a player like him, and through the first 28 games, things were different. The Clippers were 19-9. They had come back from double-digit deficits consistently and found ways to win in buildings they hadn’t won in since Clinton or Bush were in the White House.

Those days seem like a distant memory inside the Clippers' locker room right now. As Paul sat in front of his locker after Sunday’s loss to Golden State, he tried to search for ways to describe how the Clippers fell behind by 21 points in the third quarter to a 17-20 team not in the playoff hunt.

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The first half of the regular season went about as well as could be expected for the new-look Los Angeles Clippers. They lost some games they should have won, they won some games they should have lost and looked far better than any team in franchise history. Then again, we are talking about a franchise that has only made the postseason four times in the past 35 years. In fact they have already won more games so far this season than they have in eight previous complete seasons.

The real test, however, for the Clippers will come during the second half of the season, when they will be tested with the most grueling stretch of games that any player or coach on the team said they have ever been a part of. Here are eight storylines to track as the Clippers head into the stretch run of their season.

1. March on

The Clippers' season will be shaped, for better or for worse, during the month of March when the team will play 20 games in 31 days, including six road games in nine days to start the month. “Beast,” said Clippers guard Chris Paul when asked about the month. “But we knew that when the season started.”

No team played fewer games or traveled less to start the season than the Clippers. From Dec. 29 to Feb. 3, they only had to leave Staples Center four times. During that stretch players and coaches smiled and said the schedule would soon even up and catch up with them and it certainly will now as the Clippers start to make a push for playoff seeding.

“It’s important when you’re a young team to try to get home court, especially having so many guys on our team that have never played in the playoffs,” Paul said. “It would definitely be a huge advantage for us. I was telling all the guys in the locker room, all the games are over; teams are going to start jockeying for position. Guys are not going to be sitting out and resting anymore.”

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PLAYA VISTA, Calif. – “Beat L.A.!”

Chris Paul had heard the chant several times last year when the New Orleans Hornets played the Los Angeles Lakers in the first round of the playoffs. He grew up hearing the chant whenever he would watch the Lakers play on the road and he no doubt thought he might hear the chant during the two minutes or so he was supposedly on the Lakers.

Paul, however, has started to hear the chant every time the Clippers are on the road and it is one of the many signs he says he thinks the perception of the Clippers is beginning to change.

“I’m starting to hear that a lot,” Paul said. “It’s funny because our New Orleans fans used to chant that all the time against the Lakers. It makes the game that much more exciting. It's good.”

This season the Clippers are the biggest draw in the NBA on the road, averaging 19,441, putting them ahead of the Los Angeles Lakers (19,126), Miami Heat (18,973) and Boston Celtics (18,076).

“That’s how it’s going to be,” Clippers guard Randy Foye said. “Every game this season, and this is something new for me, is sold out and fans are there cheering an hour or so before the game. That’s great, that’s something this team hasn’t had and something this city has never seen from this team.”

Foye has even started seeing a change in the way opposing teams at home act when they play the Clippers; perhaps feeding off the energy of the sold our crowd.

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LOS ANGELES – Caron Butler was almost on the New Jersey Nets this season.

After the first quarter of Monday’s game between the Nets and the Los Angeles Clippers, Butler (15) nearly outscored the entire Nets team (17).

Butler finished with 20 points, 6 rebounds, 5 assists and 3 steals as the Clippers beat the Nets 101-91 and remained atop the Pacific Division with the third-best record in the Western Conference.

Nearly six weeks ago when Butler was in New Jersey for a meeting with Nets officials, he was convinced he would sign with them. About 20 seconds after walking out of a meeting with Nets general manager Billy King he got a called from Clippers general manager Neil Olshey. He had met with Olshey and Clippers coach Vinny Del Negro the day before at the team’s training center.

“I was actually in New Jersey when I got the phone call from Neil to come back here and sign the contract, so it was ironic that it happened like that,” Butler said. “You know, I wanted to play with Deron [Williams] to have an opportunity to play with a point guard like that, but sitting down with Neil and coach I knew that we had the opportunity to get a big-time free agent or a guy that was on the market like Dwight Howard or Chris Paul and I wanted to opportunity to play with a young nucleus like that in a city like L.A.”

Butler was the first of the Clippers’ three big additions of Paul and Chauncey Billups to arrive in Los Angeles and says he didn’t do so because of the money (he signed a 3-year, $24 million contract) but the direction of the franchise, which is a rarity for the Clippers.

“Actually, more money was in New Jersey,” Butler said. “I just think that the direction of the franchise at the time and it was a lot of uncertainty surrounding Dwight Howard and his situation. I just didn’t know what was going to happen and I couldn’t wait.”

The Clippers apparently couldn’t wait either, acquiring Billups and Paul less than a week after signing Butler in order to build a championship contender this season.

While Paul and Mo Williams are recovering from injuries this week, the Clippers will rely on Butler to be more aggressive and ask him to be more versatile, playing him at small forward and shooting guard.

“We’ve got a lot of guys with versatility,” Butler said. “And let us not forget, Chauncey Billups was an MVP of the Finals and a guy that carried a franchise for years and years. And he’s ‘Mr. Big Shot,’ you know, a guy that can step up in any role. If one of our starting point guards goes down then you’ve got to put Chauncey Billups in the starting point guard role.”

LOS ANGELES -- Los Angeles Clippers coach Vinny Del Negro said he was aware that Los Angeles Lakers coach Mike Brown planned to ask the league to examine the tape of Clippers forward Blake Griffin pushing Lakers guard Darrius Morris while Morris went up for a dunk late in the first quarter of their game Saturday night.

“The whistle had already blown,” Del Negro said. “There was no intent for anyone to hurt anybody there. We’re going to protect our basket and when the whistle blows you’re supposed to stop playing. I didn’t think there was anything malicious there. I thought there were some other things in the game that have to be looked at as well.”

Del Negro said he had no plans to notify the league of those “other things” and had yet to hear from the league about Griffin’s play. The Lakers were called for four individual technical fouls in the game while the Clippers were called for one.

“I think it’s just an intense game and it’s going to be physical,” Del Negro said. “You just don’t want anything that’s malicious. No one wants to see anybody get injured but you want your guys to playing hard and playing the right way.”

PLAYA VISTA, Calif. -- Trust is not built overnight and neither are championship contenders but at some point the two usually go hand-in-hand and Los Angeles Clippers guard Chris Paul said he can already see that taking place.

“Trust,” Paul said when asked where the team has made its biggest strides this season. “I think trust. Even though we’re nowhere near where we want to be you can see the signs of trust. Our communication is picking up on the defensive end and we’re starting to talk a little more and know where each other is going to be and know that we have one another’s backs.”

The Clippers began to improve defensively in their overtime win over the Miami Heat Wednesday night, holding the Heat to 39.5 percent shooting. LeBron James, Chris Bosh and Dwyane Wade missed a combined seven shots and the Heat were 1-for-10 from the field in the extra period. It was easily the Clippers’ most complete game of the season even though they still rank last in the NBA in rebounds per game and in the bottom eight in points allowed per game.

“Defensively is where we hope to continue to improve,” Paul said. “Some nights we’re going to make shots and some nights we’re not but one thing that can always remain consistent is our effort and our defense.”

After the win against Miami, the Clippers were careful not to label it a statement game and have taken the same approach leading into their much-hyped game against the Los Angeles Lakers on Saturday night.

“Statement games are big in college but even though we’re playing a shortened season, we’re still playing 66 games,” Clippers forward Blake Griffin said. “We could win 10 statement games and lose the other 56 and be in a bad position so I’m not really for all that.”

Although the Clippers beat the Lakers in both of their exhibition games, Paul said he doesn’t believe that has any bearing on Saturday’s game.

“We ran a lot of our plays and they ran a lot of their plays,” Paul said. “Preseason is all good and well but it’s really not the intensity of a regular season game. This is a division game for us. This is a big game for us and we have to take care of our home court, which is, I guess, their home court too.”