New Bennedict Mathurin Injury Adds to Clippers Concerns

The Los Angeles Clippers are entering the last 14 games of the regular season. This crucial stretch will play a huge role in how far they can go this season. The Clippers currently have a one-game lead over the No. 9 seed Golden State Warriors. If they maintain this lead, they will be in a good spot as they hope to clinch a playoff spot through the play-in tournament.

Unfortunately, however, the Clippers are dealing with a few injury concerns. Kawhi Leonard exited the loss to Sacramento early on Saturday after spraining his left ankle. He proceeded to miss the following game against the Spurs. LA ended up losing both games to fall to 34-34 for the season. The Clippers head on a three-game road trip, including a back-to-back against the Pelicans in New Orleans starting on Wednesday. Leonard has travelled with the team with the hopes of making his return on the trip.

While Clippers fans desperately await a positive injury update from Leonard, they were dealt disappointing news from Bennedict Mathurin. The 23-year-old forward is reportedly dealing with an injury to his right big toe. Per Clippers insider Joey Linn, he will undergo treatment with the team and will not play in the next three games.

Kawhi Leonard has been upgraded to questionable tomorrow against the Pelicans.

Bennedict Mathurin has been ruled out for the entire road trip.

The Clippers say Mathurin has been dealing with an injury to the big toe on his right foot. He is with the team to undergo treatment…
— Joey Linn (@joeylinn_) March 17, 2026

Clippers Now Dealing With an Injury to Bennedict Mathurin

This is the first time Mathurin's toe issue has popped up on the injury report since he joined the Clippers. He has played in every game for the Clippers, averaging over 30 minutes per game. When he was with the Indiana Pacers in the first half of the season, however, Mathurin missed extended time due to a right big toe sprain and a thumb sprain suffered in the second game of the season. He had missed 22 out of Indiana's 50 games before the trade.

This could be a case of the Clippers being overly cautious with a valuable player, as they were with Darius Garland after he joined at the deadline. Garland was also recovering from a toe injury and sat out for almost a month after arriving in LA. This has paid dividends for the Clippers as the dynamic guard has been looking like his former All-Star self in recent games.

The Clippers hope that this will be the case for Mathurin as well. Despite having big scoring games, Mathurin is in the midst of his least efficient stretch and has a 55.7% True Shooting as a Clipper. This is mostly due to the fact that he has shot 11/60 from three (18.3%). Whether his toe issue was contributing to his shooting struggles is unclear, but the Clippers would love to see an uptick in efficiency in his return.

If Leonard needs more time before returning, the Clippers will be very short-handed on the offensive side of the ball. Assuming that Darius Garland will also miss one leg of the back-to-back set, head coach Ty Lue will have to dig deep into his bench and try to find enough offense to avoid falling below .500 again.