By Jeremy Harness

On one hand, the Warriors nearly came back from an 18-point deficit but came up painfully short in Game 3 of this best-of-seven series.

On the other, however, the Los Angeles Clippers appeared to have gotten away with a pair of fouls that went the other way and made the biggest difference as the Warriors fell 98-96 at Oracle Arena Thursday night.

The Warriors struggled shooting the ball for most of the night, but they somehow managed to string together a run late in the fourth quarter to give themselves a great chance to pull out the win.

Stephen Curry hit a pair of highly-contested 3-pointers to bring the Warriors to within a point with 11 seconds left, and when Clippers guard Chris Paul made one of two from the free-throw line, the opportunity was there.

Curry, who scored 16 points to go along with 15 assists while the Clippers were bent on making him a passer, got a slight look at another 3-ball, and Paul shoved his forearm into Curry’s hip as he was in mid-air, which was not called and appeared to play greatly in the shot falling short and sending the Warriors to a 2-1 deficit in the series.

The Clippers also appeared to get away with another foul about 20 seconds earlier, as Blake Griffin, who had 32 points on Thursday on 15-of-25 shooting, drew a foul on Draymond Green, which turned out to be Green’s sixth.

Although Green was clearly moving his feet at the point of contact, Griffin pushed off to knock Green to the floor and draw the whistle.

Early on in the second half, however, it didn’t appear that this kind of finish was possible. The Warriors found themselves down by only three at halftime despite going 1-for-12 from 3-point territory in the first half.

As the Warriors continued to sputter on offense in the second half, the Clippers distanced themselves and eventually grew the lead to 18 points before the home team slowly began to make their charge.