On Monday night the Portland Trail Blazers played a version of the Los Angeles Lakers that looked like a version of those 1970’s bands still touring their greatest hits. You know how it works. The name burns bright on the marquee but the only legacy member of the group is the bass player, accompanied by the son of the original keyboardist. Everyone else is a hired gun.
Without LeBron James or Luka Doncic in uniform, Los Angeles was pretty much One Dog Night. Austin Reaves scored 41, but Portland still ran away with the game, 122-108.
Here are the take-aways from the evening.
The Trail Blazers started this game as flat as Kyrie Irving’s classroom globe. They trotted rather than ran to cover the three-point arc. They barely stayed in front of their men on the drive. They didn’t push the ball on offense. It was like this year’s Blazers had been replaced by last year’s model. Fortunately the Lakers had no offensive attack outside of Reaves, otherwise this might well have been a 40-10 start in favor of L.A.
After a lackadaisical start, the Blazers were saved by their second unit. With the reserves they got tempo up and down the floor. The main catalyst was Jerami Grant, who put on his big boy shoes and went into the lane when Portland had been passing around the perimeter up to that point. Upon Grant’s advent, the rest of the team caught fire and all of a sudden the new-look Blazers were back. Jerami finished with 22 points on 7-13 shooting with 3 assists and 3 steals.
Shaedon Sharpe had a great dunk in the second quarter, but that was an oasis in a desert of stuttering moves and odd shots. He made a mini-comeback in the second half, but it was another tough outing for Portland’s would-be star: 6-16 shooting, 16 points in 29 minutes. On the bright side, Sharpe had 4 steals and 7 rebounds. That’ll keep you on the floor.
One saving grace is that the Lakers had almost no offensive coordination. When the Blazers began pressing, it paid dividends. L.A. finished the game with 25 turnovers. Portland committed 19 themselves, but 25 is a LOT.
Another reality for L.A. is that their three-point shooting–particularly without LeBron and Luka–is as bad as Portland’s. And that’s saying something. The Lakers shot 1-12 on threes in the first half. By comparison, Portland’s 5-19, 26% rate looked Curry-esque. (If you want to know how the game went before intermission, note that the Blazers were up by only 6 at that point.) L.A. finished 7-27 from the arc.
If the Blazers went back to an older mode tonight, at least we should acknowledge that their offensive rebounding worked. It used to be a hallmark of their attack. It’s less emphasized now. But Portland still got 19 offensive boards leading to an astonishing 35 second-chance points.
If this was a revenge game for Deandre Ayton (against the team who spent $30 million for nothing, just to facilitate his current job with the Lakers), the response was tepid. Ayton had 4 fouls in the third period playing soft defense. He ended up playing 36 minutes, scoring 16 with 8 rebounds and 2 steals.
When the game was in the balance and Portland needed help, Deni Avdija bailed them out. He hit 5-8 from the three-point arc, scoring a team-high 25 points. Every time the offense got forced into the halfcourt, Avdija responded. Thank goodness the Blazers had him.
Speaking of, Jrue Holiday also stepped up for the Blazers in the second half, putting daggers in the Lakers when they thought about a comeback. Pouring the offense like maple syrup on a pancake, Holiday finished with 24 points on 10-15 shooting with 6 assists, 5 rebounds, 2 blocks, and a steal in 30 minutes.
The Lakers tried to make a late-game push, but the Blazers fended them off by taking the ball to the rim. This is a departure of sorts from prior seasons, when pick and rolls into jumpers or kick-out threes would have been the norm. Credit the Blazers for keeping their heads–and their aggressiveness–late.
The Blazers face the Utah Jazz at 6:00 PM, Pacific on Wednesday night.
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