Luka Dončić danced with Amir Coffey on the left wing, crossing over twice before stepping back for his third 3-pointer of the first quarter.

As the ball swished through the net, Dončić motioned toward the Los Angeles Clippers bench, yelling and gesturing, “You gotta step up! You gotta step up!”

Like a bull, when Dončić sees the Clippers, he sees red. And with the Clippers “redding” — the Lakers’ internal term for switching defensively — Dončić dictated the terms of the matchup.

Coach JJ Redick has referred to Dončić’s emotion-laden flurries as “blackouts.” But on Sunday, with Dončić leading the Lakers with 29 points and nine assists in their 108-102 win over the Clippers, their sixth straight victory to propel them to No. 2 in the Western Conference, Redick had a new term.

“He played fantastic tonight,” Redick said. “It was that verve and that spirit of competition. Maybe it’s an inner demon, I don’t know — but it comes out and it’s fantastic for us when it does.”

No one brings out Dončić’s “inner demon” quite like the Clippers, whom Dončić has tortured for years. The Clippers won their 2020 and 2021 playoff matchups against the Dallas Mavericks in six and seven games, respectively, but Dončić led the Mavs to a six-game first-round series win last April. In his 19 playoff games against the Clippers, Doncic has averaged 32.4 points, 8.8 rebounds and 9.5 assists.

Entering Sunday’s game, Dončić has averaged 32.5 points per game against the Clippers in the regular season — his highest average against an opponent he has played at least 10 times (28 of the 30 teams qualify, with Dallas and Detroit being the two exceptions).

“Maybe, obviously,” Dončić said when asked if he enjoyed getting testy with the Clippers. “We went back and forth a lot with the Clippers. That’s what I like. For me, that’s fun. And that’s how I get going, especially on the basketball court.”

The Lakers were plus-19 in his 36 minutes, the second-best mark on the team behind Dorian Finney-Smith (plus-24). Outside of the Denver win, this was as comfortable as Dončić has looked offensively as a Laker.

“It just seemed like throughout the game, when we needed a bucket, when we needed him to draw a second, third defender at times, he was able to make the right play — minus the six turnovers,” Redick said.

Dončić’s teammates fed off his energy and hot start, leading to another inspired defensive effort.

“You’ve got a guy in your corner going Super Saiyan, for lack of a better word,” Gabe Vincent said. “And making great plays, hitting shots, it’s a lot of fun. It can give us a lot of life, and we’ve been creating a lot of energy on the defensive side. And when he gets hot offensively, we feel like we can’t be stopped in that regard.”

With the Lakers down two starters in Austin Reaves and Rui Hachimura, their third- and fourth-leading scorers, and an emerging and important bench player in two-way guard Jordan Goodwin, they needed all of the help they could get offensively. The Lakers’ offense has mostly funneled through James, Dončić, Reaves and Hachimura in their brief period together. Without Reaves and Hachimura, the Lakers offense takes a significant hit.

Reaves is day-to-day with a right calf strain. The injury isn’t expected to cost him a significant amount of time. Hachimura’s injury is slightly more serious. He’s out with left patellar tendinopathy through at least Friday, when the Lakers’ medical staff will reassess him. With the Lakers playing the Boston Celtics at TD Garden on Saturday, Hachimura’s potential absence looms as a swing factor.

In their absence, rookie sharpshooter Dalton Knecht scored 19 points, the most he’s posted in a game since Jan. 28 in Philadelphia. He made seven of 10 shots, grabbed four rebounds (including a couple of critical ones late), and even had a couple of steals.

He connected with Dončić multiple times, a consequence of how aggressively the Clippers blitzed and doubled Dončić to try to get the ball out of his hands. Dončić and LeBron James (eight) combined for 14 of the team’s 16 turnovers, and Redick has continuously noted that the group needs to improve its offensive execution against switch-heavy defenses.

“The nature of playing with Luka Dončić is if you play drop coverage against him, you’re going to die,” Redick said. “So, teams are going to red or they’re going to blitz. We have to be better, and we’re going to figure that out. It helps when you can play all shooting lineups. I’m not concerned about that.”

Needing 18 points to reach 50,000 career points (between the regular season and playoffs), James finished just short with 17. He struggled offensively, making just six of 17 shots while adding nine assists.

The Lakers once again got by with their defense, holding their seventh straight opponent to 102 points or fewer coming out of the All-Star break. They held the Clippers scoreless for the final 7:35 of the second quarter — a masterful defensive display. The Lakers have had the No. 1 defense in the NBA since Jan. 15 — a 22-game span that stretches nearly seven weeks.

“We just play hard,” Redick said of the defense. “We compete.”

On Jan. 14, the Los Angeles Lakers were 20-17, No. 7 in the West and five games back in the loss column of the then-No. 2 Houston Rockets (26-12). Almost seven weeks later, the group has gone 18-4, ascending to 38-21 and No. 2 in the conference.

It’s an incredible turnaround that has the Lakers well-positioned in the Western Conference playoff race, with a seven-game advantage in the loss column over the No. 7 Golden State Warriors for a guaranteed playoff spot.

But as they navigate injuries to key starters and the third-hardest schedule by opponent win percentage, the Lakers are trying to maintain perspective. Despite being the hottest team in the NBA since mid-January, they aren’t worrying about their seeding yet.

For now, Redick’s goal is for the Lakers to remain in the top six and earn a playoff spot, avoiding the Play-In tournament.

“Until that is secured, the seeding thought won’t cross my mind,” Redick said.