NBA Fans Praise Kawhi, Harden, Clippers for Routing Jokic, Westbrook, Nuggets in G3

The Los Angeles Clippers are two wins away from advancing past the first round of the playoffs for the first time since the 2020-21 season.

Los Angeles handled the Denver Nuggets with relative ease in a 117-83 victory in Thursday's Game 3 of their first-round series at Intuit Dome. It is now up 2-1 in the series and can advance by simply taking care of business in its remaining home games.

While nobody shifted into full takeover mode like Kawhi Leonard did in Game 2, the victors used a balanced attack to put the game away. James Harden (20 points, nine assists and six rebounds), Leonard (21 points, 11 rebounds and six assists), Norman Powell (20 points) and Ivica Zubac (19 points and nine rebounds) led the way.

On the other side, Nikola Jokić did what he could to keep the Nuggets within striking distance with a triple-double of 23 points, 13 rebounds and 13 assists, but the outcome was never truly in doubt in the second half.

Social media showed some love to the Clippers for their performance:

Los Angeles had all the momentum heading into Thursday's contest after stealing home-court advantage behind Leonard's individual brilliance in Game 2, and it wasted little time building on it.

It jumped out to an 18-point halftime lead with Harden leading the way with an array of outside shots and impressive passes when the defense collapsed. He poured in 20 points in the first half alone and set the tone from a scoring perspective.

The 11-time All-Star then shifted into more of a facilitating role in the second half as the Clippers kept Denver at bay. That opened the door for Leonard and Powell to find their shooting strokes and Zubac to provide some interior scoring.

It wasn't just those four starters who proved to be a problem for the Nuggets.

Nicolas Batum got hot from three-point range off the bench and provided the type of secondary scoring that Denver has struggled to find for much of the season. Jokić, Jamal Murray and even Aaron Gordon played well at times, but the visitors didn't have nearly as many contributors to keep pace.

It also didn't help that Michael Porter Jr. and Russell Westbrook struggled with their shots given how important they are to the offense.

The end result was a dominant win for the Clippers, who will have the chance to seize full control of the series at home in Saturday's Game 4.