Blake Griffin double-dribbled away the Clippers’ comeback chances

The Clippers found themselves down five to the Minnesota Timberwolves on Monday night with 30 seconds left in the fourth quarter and needed a near miracle to pull off a comeback. And the miracle started to take place.

First, Blake Griffin found a wide open Wesley Johnson for a dunk under the basket. Then the Clippers forced a turnover on the Wolves’ inbounds play, giving them a chance to tie it up or cut the lead to just one.

But after Lou Williams missed on a three that careened off the rim and into the back-court and after Griffin darted into the backcourt to recover the loose ball, the Clippers star shattered his team’s odds by breaking a fundamental basketball rule:

Don’t touch the ball with two hands in between dribbles:

That’s right. Griffin double-dribbled on the Clippers’ critical late-game possession, an egregious error that all but destroyed their odds at upsetting the No. 3 seeded Timberwolves at home. And to make matters worse, Griffin turned the ball over again on the next possession by throwing an errant pass in Williams’ direction but far out of his reach and out of bounds.

After those successive turnovers, Doc Rivers and Mike Woodson had enough. They were both ejected with double technical fouls. And had assistant coach Sam Cassell, already armed with one technical, joined in on the fun, Los Angeles could have secured a never-before-seen trifecta of coaching ejections:

Man, things in Los Angeles ended weird. But it all started with Griffin breaking that fundamental rule.

Don’t double dribble, fam!