The Think Tank

The Portland Trail Blazers thumped on Oklahoma City tonight for their 50th win, marking our second 50 win season in a row and ensuring that we will not be facing the LA Lakers in the first round of the NBA Playoffs – and they did it without Brandon Roy, who tore his meniscus in the first quarter of Sunday’s game against the Lakers.  Somehow that only seems natural for this year: after our final game of the season on Wednesday night (against the Golden State Warriors) the Blazers will have a combined total of 308 games missed due to injury this year alone.

But, that’s a depressing topic.  On to the game…

This game felt like a Playoff game from the moment we stepped foot in the Rose Garden.  All 20,000+ people were totally pumped and ready for a badly needed win against another team vying for playoff position.  Going into tonight, the Blazers were in a three way tie with Oklahoma City and San Antonio for the last three seeds in the West.  Portland owned the tie-breaker against the Spurs be virtue of a 4-0 record versus the Spurs this year, and a win tonight over the Thunder would mean that we would also own the tie-breaker against OKC.  With only one game left after tonight for all three teams a Blazer win would catapult us over the Thunder and put us in fantastic position to finish in 6th place, but possibly even more important, it would guarantee that we would NOT be in 8th.

The game started out well with the Blazers jumping to an early lead, but the Thunder came on strong and our bench withered under the assault.  The quarter was capped off by two three point plays from Kevin Durant, the last of which was a buzzer-beating three point shot to put them up by six after the first period.

The second quarter was better but our defense still closely resembled Swiss cheese and the Thunder acted like a starved Mighty Mouse, helped by the fact that Batum, Camby and Aldridge were all saddled with early fouls which kept them sitting on the bench.

Andre Miller took it upon himself to keep the team in it and lead a late second quarter surge to get Portland back into single digits at half time, but the feeling in the Rose Garden was far from happy.  Durant was on fire, burning everyone who dared to attempt to guard him, draining runners, jumpers, treys and even dishing a few assists here and there, torching the Blazers for a total of 21 at the half.

On Portland’s end, Mr. Rebound (Marcus Camby) only had 1 rebound for the half and the Blazers had exactly twice as many fouls…

I’m not sure what happened in the locker room during halftime, but the Blazer team that took the floor was a whole different beast than had played the first half – and that beasts name was Marcus Camby (with a little bit of Miller-Time thrown in for good measure).  From the opening play of the third quarter Portland let it be known that they were not going to go quietly into the night, scoring 8 unanswered points in just 2:10 to bring the score even at 51, thanks to a beautiful Nicolas Batum dunk.  The Thunder quickly called a TO, but the Blazers weren’t going to have any of that, stealing the ball out of the time out and scoring another bucket for 10 straight.

Camby came alive, snatching nine boards in the quarter and scoring put-backs and receiving passes which he turned into powerful dunks.   Miller drove and dished like some mad combination of Mario Andretti and Martha Stewart.  Jared Bayless drove the basket for some good points, then drained a corner three just to keep OKC honest.  Batum and Webster stuck to Durant like glue, limiting him to only 4 points in the quarter.  Still, the Thunder held on and kept the game close, the lead seesawing back and forth.  With 4 seconds left in the quarter and the score tied, Bayless grabbed a rebound and scorched his way up court, finishing with an awe-inspiring, in-your-face layup at the buzzer to give the Blazers the lead heading into the final quarter.

The Blazers owned the fourth quarter, making the over-achieving Thunder look very much the way that Houston made the over-achieving Blazers look last year. With about four minutes to go, Miller drove the baseline, drawing his defender to him, then dished a gorgeous wrap-around pass to Marcus Camby who dunked it home for a 12 point lead – the largest of the night for either team. The crowd – already raucous in anticipation for the victory – went nuts, rising in unison, screaming, clapping, shouting, whistling, stomping their feet. I’ve rarely heard it so loud in there. We would never sat down again for the rest of the night.

OKC came out of the time out with some inspired playing, making a little five point mini-run, but in the end Portland’s veteran players were too much for the Thunder and we walked away with a 103-95 victory.

Marcus Camby (who had only one rebound and a couple of points at half time) finished with 30 points, 13 boards and 3 assists. That’s his highest scoring night in almost four years. I have to say that I was not happy about the trade the brought him to Portland when I heard about, but I will happily admit that I was totally wrong. This guy is amazing, and he has been great since the first moment he took the floor in a Portland uniform.

Andre Miller finished with 22 points and 7 assists. Again, here was a great aquisition (one that I was totally excited about, even before Portland was really talking about it) and another player who has without a doubt played a pivotal role in getting us where we are. I can hardly say enough for good things about Andre Miller.

Batum finished with 15 points and 5 boards, not his best numbers of the year, but again he did a great job keeping Durant quiet in the second half, limiting the Thunder’s #2 draft pick to just 9 points in the final 24 minutes of play (with a great deal of help from Martel Webster, I should add).

Aldridge finished the night with 15 points and 5 boards after being hampered for most of the game with foul trouble.

San Antonio also won tonight, whooping the Timberpuppies 133-111. That means that with the loss tonight, OKC is mired in 8th place and will now officially be meeting the World Champion Los Angeles Lakers in their first-ever Playoff appearance. Sucks to be them.

Portland is in 6th by virtue of our tie-breaker over San Antonio. Both teams have one game remaining: Portland at home against Golden State and San Antonio against the Mavericks in Dallas.

The playoff race is still very murky, with 2-8 separated by only 4 games, and several teams in a dead tie. If the Playoffs started today, Portland would be playing the Denver Nuggets, who have beaten us handily in every contest this year, and three our of four last year.

Personally I would like to play Dallas, which is a very real possibility. I can think of three possible ways for that to happen:

1. If we lose on Wednesday and San Antonio beats Dallas, we would move into 7th and play Dallas.
2. If we win and Dallas loses both of their remaining games, Dallas would drop to 3rd and again we would play Dallas.
3. If we win and Dallas loses one of their last two games, and Denver wins all of their remaining games, Dallas again winds up in 3rd and meets up with the Blazers in the first round.

Of course, its still possible for Utah and Phoenix – who are tied right now – to move up into any of those positions as well.  So in reality, there is just no way to know what’s going to happen.

The next two days are going to be really fun…