Ty Lue acknowledges that he requires James Harden to be exceptional during Kawhi Leonard's absence

With the news of Kawhi Leonard being on the sidelines for a few more weeks, the Los Angeles Clippers have been forced to put a heavy load on former NBA MVP James Harden. Following their season-opening 116-113 overtime loss to the Phoenix Suns, head coach Ty Lue emphasized they have no choice but to lean on “The Beard’s” scoring and playmaking abilities until Kawhi can rejoin the roster.

Heavy minutes

Against the Suns, the 35-year-old Harden played 40 minutes and scored 29 points, going 10-for-28 from the field, 12 rebounds, eight assists, and a steal. However, his struggles with protecting the ball from the preseason continued into the regular season, as he committed eight turnovers.

Despite that, Lue was pleased with what he saw from his ace guard, except for the number of minutes he played.

“Not as many minutes, I think. Overtime really put him in a spot we didn’t want him to be in as far as minutes but we had no choice at that point,” Lue said during the postgame presser.

The former NBA champion coach added that he hopes to see more of the same numbers from the 10-time All-Star, bluntly saying, “We need him to be special until Kawhi gets back.”

Hard lessons learned

No matter how long anyone has been in the league, losing never gets easy. Losses feel the same, whether they’re lopsided or close defeats. Lue said they’ll look at the tape and show the players where they can get better in anticipation of their next game on Saturday against three-time MVP Nikola Jokic and the Denver Nuggets.

“Good first game. Good first start. We got to continue getting better like we talked about and just go from there. But this is a good game for us to learn some lessons, understand what we’re trying to do and capitalize on it so we’ll get back to the drawing board on Friday,” Lue shared.

Related: Insights from the LA Clippers' season-opening defeat to the Phoenix Suns