The LA Clippers just concluded their first playoff game against the fifth-seeding Dallas Mavericks in California. Luka Doncic and Kyrie Irving took the offensive lead and dropped a combined 64 points. Despite this, the combined effort of the Clippers’ offensive roster worked more effectively and defeated their rivals by a score of 109-97! While James Harden’s performance as usual was brought to the spotlight, another player whose play garnered the attention of the masses was point guard Russell Westbrook.

During his 23 minutes on the court, Westbrook dropped 13 points, 4 rebounds and 4 assists. The astonishing feat was not his offensive capabilities, but his defensive ones. During his time on the court, the player went up against some of the best names in the league and limited them to just a 33% Field Goal Percentage and 0% 3Ps. It didn’t take long for NBA enthusiasts to take to the comments section and share their reactions.

One of them complimented the veteran on his defensive prowess, stating it has been seen all year, but it has been hardly noticeable by fans which is “a shame”!

Westbrook was seldom without any admirers in the comments, with a rare social media user stating that the player can truly achieve heights once he decides to put his mind to the game.

A netizen brought up an earlier stat of the 35-year-old when the NBA regular season was still at its half-point stage. While he admitted to not having kept track of it in recent days, the user was still impressed by the ‘lowest FG against’ record.

One user highlighted how Westbrook’s defensive performance was on par with Draymond Green‘s recent prediction. Followed by another individual, who briefly mentioned how many people chose to initially ignore “madman” Green’s words.

All in all, the comments were supportive of Westbrook’s defensive prowess. While many focused solely on him, others also sent their flowers to the Warriors’ power forward after he made use of his years of experience in delivering an accurate prophecy.

Draymond Green predicted Russell Westbrook’s defensive prowess as an ‘X-Factor’

A few days before the Clippers-Mavericks clash, Draymond Green released another episode of his highly viewed podcast. He touched base on the then-upcoming six-game series and talked about why the Clippers need to get Russell Westbrook off the bench and into the heat of battle. “The X-factor in this series is going to be Russ because Russ is gonna have to guard Kyrie with Kawhi being on Luka,” said Green.

“Russ is the X-factor for that team. No surprise they struggled for the last 1.5 months because Russ missed most of that time. At some point in this series Ty Lue is gonna have to scrap Russ off the bench and move Russ into that starting lineup in order to win this series”.

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Westbrook was absent for more than three weeks after receiving surgery on his fractured left hand. His team, which had kicked things off with a 31-8 record, started going 9-10 in his absence.

Draymond Green’s prediction turned out to be shockingly accurate. Onlookers at the LA arena often caught a glimpse of the 35-year-old point guard in action. One of the most memorable moments took place when 8:56 minutes were remaining in the second quarter. As Kyrie Irving proceeded to dash to the other side of the basketball court, Westbrook ran and overtook the player, blocked him from going any further, and made it difficult for him to make a 180-degree turn to drop the ball through the hoop.

Irving eventually found an opening, but the Clippers star’s tactics worked and he dropped the ball amidst the cheers of the crowd. Kyrie Irving is a strong offensive player. Therefore, by using Westbrook to keep him in line during the five remaining games of the playoff series, the Clippers can ensure that they have a real chance of making it to the next stage of the NBA tournament.