Clippers are excited to see the star shine in the postseason, where he is known to ‘turn it up a notch,’ like when he led San Antonio and Toronto to NBA titles
Kawhi Leonard doesn’t give away much, if anything, of how he is feeling. He’s stoic, unflinching, unsmiling and unemotional throughout the regular season, win or lose. But when the postseason rolls around, the Clippers forward isn’t shy about letting his inner Kawhi show.
All that stored-up effort led to an NBA championship with the San Antonio Spurs in 2014, when he was named NBA Finals MVP. Then, in 2019, he led the Toronto Raptors to their first NBA title and won his second Finals MVP award – joining LeBron James and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar as the only players to win that honor with different teams.
Whatever Leonard wants to call this subtle transformation, teammates and coaches have seen it up close. Guard Norman Powell had a front-row seat as a member of the Raptors when Leonard channeled his inner motivation to beat six-time NBA champions Golden State to win the franchise’s first NBA title.“I feel like y’all have seen, y’all have seen a glimpse of how Kawhi is in the postseason,” Powell said.
“He’s been turning it up another notch in the last half of the season since All-Star break,” Hyland said. “He’s been taking it to another level. Just getting comfortable out there, and you’ll see he’s got like three points, and you look back up and it’s 27, so he’s just ramping it up. ‘Playoff Kawhi’ is definitely different for sure. I’ve seen it.”
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