Ouch. These heartbreaking losses have to stop. Well, the Blazers kept up with the Miami Heat and kept the lead for most of the game, but with a couple of, as Robin Lopez put it, “dumb turnovers” and defensive miscues, the Miami Heat were able to squeak a W out in the Moda Center without the King. LeBron James was out with a groin injury and the Heat still beat the Portland Trail Blazers 108-107. This game hurt worse than the Dallas game-winner as Bosh hit the most ridiculous three-point shot of the whole game and you couple that with an extremely lucky pass by Dwayne Wade, everything just had to go right for the Heat at the end and it did.
This game was high-scoring to begin with. Portland outscored the Heat 34-30 when both teams were shooting as high as 80% during the quarter. Ridiculous numbers. This was not a defensive game by any means in the first half. With Chris Andersen and LeBron James both out for the Heat, the biggest player was Chris Bosh. The middle was open for most of the night and you could tell that the Blazers were stretching the Heat’s defense to the limits. Unfortunately, the Blazers turned the ball over 17 times and most of them were just lazy passes. Miami was reading the passing lanes well and overplaying the perimeter. In this game, if you passed you had to pass with a purpose. You had to snap it and you couldn’t just softly float it no matter where you were on the court. Whenever the Blazers had a chance to grab momentum, they would make a lazy pass to the paint or even just a simple pass to a guard in the backcourt. The Blazers know what happened and I expect the ball will be taken care of much better in their next contest. However, this game was very, very winnable. The most telling stat besides the turnovers was the scoring of the fourth quarter. Miami outscored the Blazers 25-19. The Blazers are normally really good when it comes to crunch situations and, honestly, they were again tonight. Batum was fouled with :32 remaining in the fourth from outside the three-point line and drilled all three. He, again, was fouled with :07 remaining and nailed both of those FTs. The Blazers were clutch, Chris Bosh just made a 25-foot three-pointer that would miss nine times out of ten. What makes it sting more is that the Blazers had a GREAT look at a lob for the last possession, but the ball rimmed out and that was the game.
Even though Bosh made a ridiculous shot, the Blazers should not have been in that situation. Chris Bosh missed three straight shots in the middle of the fourth quarter and the Blazers just could not take advantage of it. To the Heat’s credit, their defense was excellent. They were crowding the perimeter, double-teaming Lillard, guarding the pick-and-roll like the Clippers did the other night, and reading the passing lanes very well. However, the Blazers had a couple of opportunities to make it a more manageable game, but with turnovers and missed shots they couldn’t capitalize.
Chris Bosh finished the night with 37 points on 15-for-26 shooting, 3-for-3 from three, and 10 rebounds. This guy was on fire tonight. You can say all you want about the Blazers’ defense, but Bosh was hitting some ridiculous shots.The Heat shot 51.7% from the field and 57.1% from three. Very telling stat. The Heat also scored a whopping 60 points in the paint. Tonight, it made sense. Bosh just loved life in the paint tonight. The Blazers outrebounded the Heat 41-35 as Freeland had a career high 12 rebounds in 15 minutes. Freeland played great tonight and is continuing to thrive in his role off the bench. Another interesting stat is the bench was all positives tonight. Wright was a +7, Meyers was a +3, Freeland a +2, and Mo Williams a +11. Miami’s bench did outscore the Blazers’ 34-18, but I thought the bench provided some nice additions tonight. Meyers Leonard, for the first time for me, looked like an NBA center. He didn’t look lost and he even provided a slick hockey assist to Mo Williams to start the fast break. Is Meyers Leonard taking the next step? I’ll give it a couple more games before I give my opinion on that, but from what I have seen so far, he is finally starting to look like an 11th pick.
Wesley Matthews had a great shooting night. He finished the night with 23 points on 9-for-14 shooting, 5-for-8 from three, and was hot in the second quarter has he made 5 of his 8 shots, two being threes from the corner. The only negative about his game tonight was a lob that was perfect, but slipped out of Wesley’s hands. Bet he would like to have those two points back right about now. Otherwise, Wesley continues to have great silent stat nights. He isn’t always flashy, but afterwards you realize he has provided 15+ points on a night. He is playing some great basketball right now.
LaMarcus Aldridge still having a sore and swollen mouth from his wisdom teeth surgery was the rock again as he finished with 22 points on 9-for-20 shooting and 7 rebounds. Teams are pushing him farther out to force him to take longer shots. The problem is that he can hit them. It is still not as comfortable for him, but it is really all teams can do. I would say Bosh guarded him decently, but LA was still able to swish a few and even had a couple impressive long fade-away jumpers that swished. I bet he will be seeing that last lob in his dreams tonight and as the season progresses, but that does not take away from how well he has been playing and what he has meant to this team.
Batum flexed his defensive muscles tonight as he ended with 11 points on 2-for-6 shooting, 1-for-4 from three, 9 assists, 6 rebounds, and 3 blocks. People forget how long Batum is so it is not completely shocking that he was able to block a few tonight. His defense on Michael Beasley and others was impressive. On one Heat possession, Batum basically forced Beasley to either hoist up a horrid shot or simply walk out of bounds. Well, Beasley did both and that meant Blazer ball. Batum hit 5 clutch FTs at the end of the fourth quarter to give the Blazers a great chance to win the game. Not a stellar stat night for him, but a great hustle effort from him.
Well, Blazer fans time to get off the couch, stop sobbing, and think about the next game. The Blazers will start a back-to-back two-game road trip starting with the Pelicans in New Orleans. LaMarcus probably said it best in one of his post-game interviews, “Let’s kill them.” Should be an interesting one and yet another good test of bouncing back after a loss. Teams are definitely playing hard against the Blazers this season. It is just a matter of the Blazers adapting to the changing schemes. The Blazers will take on the Pelicans on Monday December 30th in New Orleans at 5:00 PM PST. Stay tuned!