[The DC Council — After each Wizards game: setting the scene, rating the starters, assessing the bench, providing the analysis, and catching anything that you may have missed. Unlike the real DC Council, everything here is over the table. Click here for cumulative DC Council 3-star ratings over the course of the season. Game 32 contributors: Markus Allen (@mayminded), Adam McGinnis (@AdamMcGinnis), and Rashad Mobley (@Rashad20).

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[Randy Wittman could see it coming.]

When preseason theories spoke of young legs benefiting the Wizards in a lockout-shortened season, my thinking was different. They needed all the training camp and preseason they could get, and the lack of it showed many ways in the season’s early going. Now they are starting to play better, more as a team, sharing the ball, and understanding complete effort. Big road wins in Detroit and Portland gave the young Wizards confidence going into Wednesday’s game with the Clippers. But they endured for just over 32 minutes in Los Angeles until tired legs, and more prevalently, tired minds, took over. The home team on rest with more shooting focus after a tough loss in Dallas, along with the capabilities to get shooters open shots, took the game over Washington by 18 points, 102-84. There were a couple game-deciding moments.

With 3:25 left in the third quarter, John Wall assisted a Nick Young 3-pointer for the third time in less than four minutes. Young hadn’t scored a single point in front of his hometown crowd until that first three; suddenly he had nine points. Steve Buckhantz and Phil Chenier were openly commenting on television how most of Young’s shots looked to be pressing the issue too much, but when Wall started setting him up, it looked like the Wizards would make it a game. The Wizards tied the score at 66 with that third Young three. Within the spurt, Young also had one assist, almost two had JaVale McGee not missed a shot at the rim. Oh what a dream sequence. But then what happened?

Blake Griffin went over McGee’s back for an offensive rebound, came down, gathered himself… monster dunk, 68-66 Clippers. Could the whistle have been blown against Griffin? Possibly. Physicality in the paint can be like refereeing holding in football, it can be called just about every time. The many areas of gray mean more subjectivity comes into the equation. Did McGee even try to box Griffin out? Yes, more so than usual. Other circumstance includes McGee’s lack of help on the defensive boards by the likes of Young, Jordan Crawford and Rashard Lewis.

On the other end, as the Clippers sagged off a Lewis screen for Wall, Kenyon Martin and Chris Paul ended up with a switch, Paul covering Lewis in the paint. In a perfect world Wall hits the wide open shot that Martin left him when he didn’t care to press up, paying attention to Lewis instead. In the Wizards world, McGee waited too long to clear the paint so the Wizards could best iso Lewis against Paul. Then the timing was thrown off when Wall waited too long to pass, and Lewis couldn’t hold a seal. The result was a Wizards turnover, and the Clippers went demoralizing the other way with a Paul alley-oop to Griffin that the athleticism of Wall unsuccessfully tried to get too. John was high but far short. Some photographer has a great one of that play. Washington called timeout but didn’t score for the rest of the period. They went into the fourth quarter down 74-66 thanks to an 8-0 Clippers run.

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[The DC Council -- After each Wizards game: setting the scene, rating the starters, assessing the bench, providing the analysis, and catching anything that you may have missed. Unlike the real DC Council, everything here is over the table. Click here for cumulative DC Council 3-star ratings over the course of the season. Game 28 contributors: Rashad Mobley (@Rashad20), John Converse Townsend (@JohnCTownsend), and Kyle Weidie (@Truth_About_It).]

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Here we go again… Tonight’s Wizards-Raptors game is the third of four meetings between the two clubs. Washington and Toronto have split the 2011-12 series thus far, each team celebrating a decisive victory over the other — the average winning margin is 16 points. Although the Torontonians have been more successful on the road (5 wins) than the D.C. locals have been at home (3 wins) this season, the Raptors haven’t won a game at the Verizon Center since 2009. Consider heading to the game if you have a couple of hours to kill tonight: tickets can be scored for a buck! Raptorholic Sam Holako (@RapsFan) of ESPN TrueHoop/Raptors Republic joins TAI’s John Converse Townsend (@JohnCTownsend) and Kyle Weidie (@Truth_About_It) for tonight’s 3-on-3 roundball roundtable. Three questions, three answers starts now…

#1) Fact or Fiction: Rashard Lewis will score four or more points tonight, joining Jason Kidd and Paul Pierce as the only players in NBA history to have scored at least 15,000 points, grabbed 5,000 rebounds and hit 1,500 three-pointers in their careers. [UPDATE: Lewis is out versus the Raptors due to what is being called a sore right knee; Chris Singleton replaced him in the Wizards starting lineup.]

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[The DC Council -- After each Wizards game: setting the scene, rating the starters, assessing the bench, providing the analysis, and catching anything that you may have missed. Unlike the real DC Council, everything here is over the table. Click here for cumulative DC Council 3-star ratings over the course of the season. Game 24 contributors: Adam McGinnis (@adammcginnis), John Converse Townsend (@JohnCTownsend), and Kyle Weidie (@Truth_About_It).]

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[The DC Council -- After each Wizards game: setting the scene, rating the starters, assessing the bench, providing the analysis, and catching anything that you may have missed. Unlike the real DC Council, everything here is over the table. Game 23 contributors: Adam McGinnis (@adammcginnis), Arish Narayen, and Kyle Weidie (@Truth_About_It).]

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[The DC Council -- After each Wizards game: setting the scene, rating the starters, assessing the bench, providing the analysis, and catching anything that you may have missed. Unlike the real DC Council, everything here is over the table. Game 21 contributors: Markus Allen (@mayminded), John Converse Townsend (@JohnCTownsend), and Kyle Weidie (@Truth_About_It).]

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[The DC Council -- After each Wizards game: setting the scene, rating the starters, assessing the bench, providing the analysis, and catching anything that you may have missed. Unlike the real DC Council, everything here is over the table. Game 20 contributors: Adam McGinnis, Rashad Mobley and Kyle Weidie.]

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[The DC Council -- After each Wizards game: setting the scene, rating the starters, assessing the bench, providing the analysis, and catching anything that you may have missed. Unlike the real DC Council, everything here is over the table. Game 19 contributors: Sam Permutt, John Converse Townsend and Kyle Weidie.]

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Advice? “Be yourself,” said Randy Wittman after winning in his Wizards head coaching debut on Wednesday. But did the Wizards players need a new voice? “I’m just here,” said Nick Young, while teammate Andray Blatche’s response was, “I can’t honestly say that we needed a new voice, we just needed… somebody to actually check us like Wittman did.” And the erudite JaVale McGee? “Whatever [Ernie Grunfeld] explained was the reason why he fired Flip, was the reason that he fired Flip.”

The Wizards? They still don’t know what they want, or who they are, or if their new coach is going to slap the proverbial taste of nicotine out their mouths. It’s like the rest of this season is an in-game training camp. The Wizards were already a statistically fast-paced team under Flip Saunders… Screw that, says Randy Wittman (paraphrasing here)… I’m going to run you guys even more. And at that… John Wall, the fastest athlete? Well, I’m going to call him out for conditioning (along with Nick Young) and sub them back into a game really, really late during a blowout. ”Be hard on the leader and the rest will follow,” is presumed to be Wittman’s interim idea, as I wrote on ESPN’s Daily Dime about this latest new change with the Washington franchise.

The Wizards said WHAT? Well, that’s what they said. Randy Wittman, Nick Young, John Wall, Andray Blatche, JaVale McGee and Rashard Lewis speak on it in the video above.