LOS ANGELES -- Looking back on it now, there was no way to see what Terance Mann did in the Los Angeles Clippers' 131-119 series-clinching win over the Utah Jazz on Friday night coming.
No way. Anyone who says they foresaw the second-year player scoring 39 points to send the Clippers to the first Western Conference Finals in franchise history is still delirious from watching what unfolded in front of the first full-capacity indoors crowd in Los Angeles since the COVID-19 pandemic began.
Terance Mann, a kid born in 1996, drafted No. 46 overall in the 2019 NBA draft, just helped one of the NBA's most beleaguered franchises break through a barrier that has frankly, seemed rather cursed over the years.