Clippers don’t make the effort in loss to Jazz

Reporting from Salt Lake City — The lack of energy by the Clippers quickly and decisively turned into a subpar effort Tuesday night, and that disturbed Coach Vinny Del Negro to no end.

That it occurred against a Utah Jazz team that every Clipper knew it would take an enormous amount of effort to have any success against on the road exasperated Del Negro during and after a 108-79 beat-down at EnergySolutions Arena.

Del Negro didn’t want to hear any excuses about the Clippers playing back-to-back games.

Why? Because the Clippers were in the middle of their first of two sets of back-to-back-to-back games, and Del Negro knows they must summon the vitality for Wednesday night’s game against the Dallas Mavericks at Staples Center.

“I didn’t like our approach,” Del Negro said. “I didn’t like our focus. I didn’t like our toughness. I didn’t like our energy to start the game. We dug ourselves a hole.

“We’re not going to win a lot of games playing with that type of effort. I don’t care if it is a back-to-back game, where we’re playing, how much rest they have. We have to play better than that.”

The Clippers didn’t have Chris Paul [strained left hamstring] for second straight game and reserve guard Mo Williams [sore right foot] for the third straight game.

Chauncey Billups had to deal with a tight back that Del Negro said forced him to pull the veteran guard out early when the game got out of hand.

Even so, it was not a good night for Billups, who finished with 10 points on three-for-12 shooting. Backcourt mate Randy Foye made four of 14 shots.

Billups even missed his first two free throws of the game, significant because he had entered the game having missed three all season out of 50 attempts.

“Actually my back felt good today,” Billups said. “It felt better today than it did in about a week. I’m encouraged about that.”

The Clippers scored a season low in points and shot a season-low 36.5%. They trailed by as many as 34 points.

Blake Griffin didn’t play his typical game, scoring 10 points and grabbing 11 rebounds.

He had his hands full with Jazz forward Paul Millsap, who scored 20 points in 30 minutes.

The Clippers have lost five straight to the Jazz and 11 of 12. They last won in Salt Lake City on Jan 22, 2003.

“I think any time you come to play a Utah team, energy is the No.1 staple,” Billups said. “They are going to play extremely hard.”

The onslaught started right from the beginning for Utah, which improved to 9-4.

The Clippers’ defense was nonexistent, allowing the Jazz to make 58.1% of its shots in the first quarter, putting L.A. into a 12-point hole.

The second quarter was more of the same, the Clippers going down by 15 points.

“We just weren’t tough enough defensively to start the game,” Billups said. “And that’s really the responsibility of the starters — myself and everybody else that starts the game.”

The game became a dunk-fest in the fourth quarter, and the Clippers were just bystanders, seemingly unable to stop what was happening to them.

“We just came out and played poorly. We didn’t have good energy,” Del Negro said. “We weren’t aggressive. They were more aggressive. Give Utah credit, but our starters didn’t get off to a good start with their energy defensively and Utah got into a rhythm.

“There’re no excuses. We’ve got to bounce back tomorrow night and play much harder, play smarter, play tougher, and that’s what I expect.”

broderick.turner@latimes.com

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