Blazers rain triangles, falling to thunder storm

Portland Trail Blazers entered their Sunday afternoon game against Oklahoma City Thunder winners of four equal. On paper, the game was a mismatch; Oklahoma City had 36 wins, Blazers only 17. Portland made a nice race of it, rained down destruction from the three-point bow and stayed within a few belongings of the thunder most of the day. In the end, 35 points from Shai Gilgeous-Alexander showed too much for Portland to overcome. Oklahoma City won in a 118-108 win and sent Blazers to a 17-28 record, 9-12 at home in the season.

Here are some of the factors that decided the game.

Triangles

After a series of games with varied violation, pace and inside games, Blazers returned to a pattern of “If the triangles fall, we will win, if not we lose.” Fortunately, the long shots connected during extended stretches of the game, including a first period when Blazers matched the thunder with 27 points per year. But Portland’s shooting was never enough to overcome their own revenue, offensive rebounds abandoned to OKC and Shai Gilgeous-Alexander’s opportunistic violation. They needed a miracle 60% rate to have a chance. They got 52.6% in the first half, but finished the game 18-40, 45.0%. It’s a great rate, but not enough for one of the worst teams in the league to overcome the best.

Scoot

Scoot Henderson had a good night from the arch and shoots 5-11 on the way to 25 points. Not much else, though, went right. Henderson couldn’t get his team into the offense, couldn’t drive without being tied up in traffic and couldn’t pass on the goal. Often scoot will make a nice move, get separation, but then shoot a passport or shot that ends so off-target that you wonder if he has broken his sense of time and space. In the end, Henderson is like a box of chocolate. You never know what you get. Tonight it made up 5 rebounds, 1 assist, 1 block, 1 steal and 4 revenue in 30 minutes.

Shaedon

This was one of these games from Shaedon Sharpe that you just don’t understand. He spent lots of time standing outside of ball. He got almost no separation on his dribbling and shot accordingly. His defense was good for about four seconds a possession. He even missed a free kick. He looked like a bot player on NBA2K Who is certainly not the protagonist.

Sharpe ended with 10 points on 3-10 shooting, a block, revenue and a 19-minute game error. Hmmm.

Bench swings

After just describing the best two guards from the bench in non-flattering terms, you can guess the rest. Portland’s starting lineup was not terrible, but their bench was crushed. They had no domestic defense to talk about, nor much help with rotations. They spent lots of time just standing around watching the dribble on offensive: no back screens, no cuts, just waiting for something to happen. What happened was often a turnover or a brick, Portland is concise, leaving the usual bench rotation poor, but came now. They have to give more efforts than that.

Rebounding

Backing rebounding is usually a strength for Portland, not so much for OKC. Portland ended with 13, but they gave 14 back to the thunder. Even worse, Oklahoma City converted these boards to 28 second chance points, while Portland only succeeded 13. Cleaning up this state and Blazers could have had a chance.

Revenue

In collaboration with a VAT full of slam, blazers used a huge spoon of turnover to end the mixing process. They committed 15, forced only 7. They did not have much of a chance against the thunder organically. That kind of revenue imbalance transformed “not much” into “none”.

Super forward

Through all this, Toumani Camara had a whale of a game using 5-5 three-point shooting to score 24 while playing some of the only credible defense Portland put on the floor tonight.

However, he was not the leading goal scorer. Deni Avdija put 28 shoots 4-9 from the arch, 9-16 overall. He also had 8 rebounds, 8 assists and 4 revenue playing de facto Point Guard in large parts of the game.

Up next

BoxScore

Blazers will welcome to Milwaukee Bucks To Moda Center Tuesday evening with at. 19:00, Pacific start.