Blazers Pummel Pacers for yet another win

If the Portland Trail Blazers intends to stop winning anytime soon, they show no signs of it. On Tuesday night, they welcomed the Indiana Pacers to Moda Center and then continued to pummel them to submission in a 112-89 victory. Indiana felt defenders as energetic as Blazers and wore their own four -game victory that came in the evening. Portland played Bugs Bunny to their Elmer Fudd, run around them, jumped over them and generally mistakenly them in a series of mistakes and misses.

Indiana shot 42% off the floor. Their leading goal scorer, Andrew Nembhard, scored only 17. Blazers were led by Anfee Simons with 22 and Jerami Grant with 20. Scoot Henderson and Shaedon Sharpe added every 17 from the bench.

Blazers have now won 5 in a row, 9 out of their last 10.

Here are some of the factors that stood out during the game.

Futilithree

If good shooting was a dessert, this game would have been a diabetic convention. Both teams played active, appropriate defense, helped and rotated on the interior. This resulted in several looks over the arch. The pages combined to 6-30 shooting on triangles during an eyes in a first half. Blazers recovered and ended 14-37, 37.8% for the game. Indiana not only shot 5-24, 20.8%. It left Pacers hopelessly behind regardless of other development.

Scoot shooting

Scoot Henderson looks faster and more confident than ever on his three-point shooting. He went 3-5 from a distance. The number is not the Poeng, rather his willingness to take the shot (finally) and the ability to hit it (mostly). He hit a clutch three from deep with 6:10 back to walking in the game, a demoralizer reminiscent of the last point guard to make a splash in Portland. You can remember him.

In the middle of the floor is so much harder to cover against Blazers now than it was in the first months of the season. That’s at least partly partially Henderson.

Dribble to crown

The normal routine for the blazers and about 29 other NBA teams to bend the defense via penetration and then pass to the circumference of three-point shots. As we just chronized, it didn’t work very well tonight. But Portland showed another wrinkle in the offense against aggressive persecution from Indiana. They pulled double from the dribbling and then hit the cuts to layups and dunks in semi -court. Nothing strikes to see Deandre Ayton’s eyes light up when he catches the ball 12 meters from the bucket and realizes that there is no defender between himself and the edge. Boom. Dunk. Yasss.

No whistles? Nice.

The officials seemed to be happy to let the teams play tonight. It helped Portland’s physical defenders enormously. Blazers have suffered from reputation -violations for large parts of the season. When these free kicks on easy contact disappear, it is down to hand-to-hand match. Portland is pretty practical.

Blazers tried 17 free throw in total in this, Pacers 21.

Revenue

The turnover numbers do not look so remarkable; Each team committed 19, but to sure to swing the momentum. Every once in a while, one team or the other would force them. This team inevitably went on a huge strip. In particular, Blazers went on an 18-4 race in the third, after Indiana closed the lead to a single point. The stretch was triggered by a ton of steal and outlet.

Although the teams were tied in overall miscues, Portland generated a 28-12 benefit in points after turnover. Their defense doesn’t just get solid. It becomes solid while it aggressively converts defense to offense. It’s been a big thing in this series of victories.

ISO Ball

Despite the ball movement and the schemes, closing games often comes down to getting your best scoring the ball and letting them get buckets. Jerami Grant and Anfee Simons definitely filled this role for Portland tonight. Both scored from the perimeter of the fourth and crushed Pacers’ hope for a comeback. It was hardly fair. Blazers made them pay to not adapt to the role players early made them pay by doing exactly it and leaving the stars single deck late. When things go right, they go right.

How good ???

Give or take a “L” (and remember, Pacers took one tonight) Haliburton is a fine brand of briefcase. Inside this briefcase tonight for Tyrese Haliburton was exactly zero point at 0-3 shooting. This from a man who average 14 attempts and over 18 points per Fight, his team’s second -leading goal scorer.

How good is Portland’s defense right now? Sick well.

RW3

Thanks to bad trouble for Deandre Ayton, Robert Williams III got 24 minutes tonight. He provided a team leading 11 rebounds plus 3 assists, 2 blocks and 2 revenue. Donovan Clingan did not play when Williams looked like he owned in that rotation lot.

Williams is of course injured, but if Blazers holds all three centers and Ayton continues to play well, they may have an interesting dilemma for the second half of the season.

Up next

BoxScore

Portland’s homestand continues on Thursday evening as they welcome Sacramento Kings with a at. 19:00, Pacific start time.