Amid Donald Sterling Scandal, the Clippers Unite
Published at
Stephen Dunn/Getty Images(LOS ANGELES) — Basketball fans often bring home-made signs to games, showing their support using markers and construction paper. The signs at the Staples Center in Los Angeles for Tuesday’s Clippers-Warriors playoff game took an urgent, resolute tone.
“Clippers new owner wanted! Racists need not apply!” read one of the signs.
Another: “Hate will never win.”
Hate didn’t win Tuesday, but the Clippers did, 113-103, taking a 3-2 lead in a series that was, for the first time since Saturday, more about basketball than recordings featuring racist rants by banished Clippers owner Donald Sterling.
In the recorded conversations, which appeared online this weekend, Sterling can be heard telling girlfriend V. Stiviano not to post pictures of herself with black people to Instagram or bring black people to Clippers games. A separate recording features Sterling telling Stiviano that he doesn’t think he’s racist because he gives food, clothes and cars to his black employees.
Adam Silver, facing his first true test since becoming the National Basketball Assocation’s commissioner in February, acted swiftly and definitively, banning Sterling for life.
“We stand together in condemning Mr. Sterling’s views,” Silver said. “They simply have no place in the NBA.”
The punishment, which included a $2.5 million fine, is the harshest penalty ever issued by the league.
ABC US News | ABC Business News
Clippers coach Doc Rivers said that the lifetime ban of his former boss “can begin the healing process” for the team, the league and the country.
“These last three or four days have been very difficult for everybody, no matter what your race,” Rivers said in a pre-game press conference. “We can move forward. We have to. Yes, I do think [the NBA commissioner] made the right decision.”
Had Silver announced a weaker punishment — an indefinite suspension and hefty fine, for example — players were willing to boycott the playoffs, NBA Players Assocation Vice President Roger Mason said.
But with Sterling removed, the focus returned to basketball: Clippers versus Warriors, two of the Western Conference’s most dynamic squads.
Midway through the fourth quarter, as Los Angeles padded its lead, the crowd erupted into a chant. “We are one,” the fans chanted, again, and again, and again. The Clippers embraced the phrase following Tuesday’s announcement — even overhauling the team’s website to reflect the statement — but it speaks to a larger theme, a multi-cultural game enduring a difficult chapter together. Races and colors and team identifications are immaterial in this case.
We. Are. One.
The game has undergone numerous transformations over the past century, from a YMCA creation using peach baskets to a city-centric expression, a blacktop ballet. The game has now gone global, with leagues and Olympic energy across the world.
Part of basketball’s appeal is its simplicity. All you need is a ball, a flat surface and a hoop to play.
That’s what the Clippers and Warriors did Tuesday night — they played. And hate didn’t win.
Copyright 2014 ABC News Radio