Brown Can’t Watch Clippers in Victory : Pro basketball: They beat Mavericks, 119-115. Weightlifting injury sidelines coach.

The Clipper season, difficult in many ways, officially became a pain in the neck Sunday.

Coach Larry Brown was out because of a strained upper back and neck, the result of weightlifting the day before. That put assistant R.C. Buford in charge. Then the Clippers struggled to a 119-115 victory over the Dallas Mavericks at the Sports Arena.

The Clippers have a three-game winning streak for the first time since Feb. 18-26 and, at 36-36, have reached .500 for the first time since 31-31 on March 14.

“We weren’t up for this game, but a win’s a win,” said Ken Norman, who had a game-high 26 points. “Two weeks from now, people will look at our record and they won’t remember how this game was played.”

The Clippers can only hope.

“We knew this game was tight, and we knew this was a game we had to have,” Ron Harper said after getting 24 points. “I didn’t want to lose this one. I didn’t want to have to hear (friend and Dallas guard) Jimmy Jackson all night. We sure were not going to lose. At home, too?”

Harper made sure of that. After it was 105-105 with 6 1/2 minutes remaining, he scored nine of the Clippers’ next 11 points, helping give them a 116-113 edge.

The Mavericks’ response was two missed jump shots, a 14-footer in the lane by Jackson and, after a timeout with 26 seconds remaining, a straight-away bomb by Derek Harper.

Dallas, which dropped to 7-64 and needs to win three of its final 11 games to avoid tying the 1972-73 Philadelphia 76ers for the worst record in NBA history, might have gotten another chance after Harper’s miss, but Clipper Mark Jackson cut in front of Jim Jackson at the last second to deny the offensive rebound.

Mark Jackson was quickly fouled and made one of two free throws for a 117-113 lead with 15 seconds to play.

The Mavericks cut the deficit to three points on Terry Davis’ tip-in with seven seconds to go, but Danny Manning sealed the victory with two more free throws with six seconds left.

There were some positives for the Clippers amid an otherwise forgettable showing. They shot a season-best 61.9% and had 41 points in the first quarter and 71 points in the first half, both tops for 1992-93. They also committed a season-low six turnovers.

Now to see if the Clippers can do that against good teams. Playoff teams. Maybe even their future playoff opponents.

Of the next four games, three are potential first-round previews: Tuesday at Houston, Thursday at San Antonio and, after returning to the Sports Arena to face Denver on Saturday, a week from today against Phoenix.

The Clippers will probably play one of the Texas teams or the Suns in a best-of-five first-round playoff series.

That makes the next week interesting.

Clipper Notes

Even though Larry Brown didn’t spend a second on the sideline, the victory goes on his record, not that of R.C. Buford. It was the third time Buford has subbed this season, the first two coming when Brown was ejected in the second quarter of games. . . . The announced attendance, based on tickets distributed, was 12,021, but the actual was closer to 7,000. . . . The Mavericks are 1-51 the last two seasons when televised by KTVT in Dallas, including 0-27 in 1992-93.