That’s more like it! Minus the charge that Denver made late in this game that made me almost have a heart attack, this was a very solid game and there were some nice takeaways from this game that I think we can look forward to during this season. First, I will just say that defense was a lot better than the game in Phoenix. We seemed to have more energy and were able to close the door on a lot of drives, which against a team like the Nuggets is very impressive considering they score the majority of their points in the paint. The Blazers made the Denver Nuggets take a lot of contested shots or shots they just had to throw up because of the shot clock. This was really nice to see as we have heard so much about this team-wide mindset to be better on defense this season. While Blazer fans might have had their doubts about that in the first game, I sure hope that this game wiped away some of those concerns. I am not going to sit here and say that the defense is going to be superb and suffocating game in and game out, but I will say that it seems that the players are buying into that mindset and that there is real physical evidence to show that there won’t be constant free lay-ups in every game. Let’s get into the stats.
The interesting thing about this game is that the Blazers had four different players step up at different points during the game. First, I will start with Nicolas Batum. He started off Portland with 15 points in the 1st quarter. He looked like he could not miss and his threes seemingly found their way into the basket. This was nice to see as I thought Batum could be slightly more aggressive even with trying to get his teammates involved. I still would like to see him drive a bit more because I think his length and speed helps him out a lot while driving. Obviously, tonight, with his shot falling, that was not really an issue. I also noticed that whenever Evan Fournier checked in for Denver, Batum literally took him out of the game as Fournier ended with just 1 rebound and 1 steal to his name. It seems like Batum’s defense has returned somewhat as you can put him on an opposing point guard if Damian is having trouble and Batum will just shut him down. Batum ended up having 25 points, 9 rebounds, and 4 assists. These are the games that people get renewed faith in Batum. Now let’s see if he can come back strong tomorrow and follow up as consistency has always been Batum’s weakness.
Lillard had a little surge in the second quarter as he continued to swish threes and drive into the lane for fouls or lay-ups. He had some trouble early as the Denver big men seemed to be able to block his lay-ups with ease. Fortunately, he decided to shoot from the outside and went 3-for-4 from beyond the arc –impressive adaptation. Lillard’s final stat line was 18 points on 6-for-13 shooting, 7 assists, and 4 rebounds. This was really a quiet 18 points, but this happens all the time. You look at the end of the game and realize he made that much of an impact even though it wasn’t that apparent in the game.
LaMarcus Aldridge had a good night. His shooting was rough at the beginning of the game as he was 3-for-8 to start with, but towards the end of the game and especially in the fourth quarter as Denver was making their surge to cut the lead down to 7, Aldridge sent the Denver fans home as he scored the next 8 points and ended with 25 points on 12-for-26 shooting, 9 rebounds, and 4 assists. Again, LA is a machine right now and you could see that Denver did not really have an answer towards the end. Brian Shaw, the new Denver head coach, also made a crucial mistake in having J.J. Hickson or Kenneth Faried guarding him one-on-one and not having any double teams on LA. I guess you have to pick your poison with this Blazer team now, but that just seemed odd to me.
However, the most impressive stat of the night was Wesley Matthews. Funnily enough, in the middle of the game, I was thinking to myself “where is Wesley Matthews?” He has been struggling since the preseason and it has been a bummer to see him have an off few games. It was as if he had heard me because, after I said that, he caught fire and ended with 21 points on 7-for-13 shooting, 4-for-4 from beyond the arc, 12 (yes 12) rebounds, and 3 assists. Welcome back Wesley Matthews! Geez! It seemed that the ball always found its way into his hands for the rebounds. At first, you see that he has 5 rebounds and you think “no big deal that is normal for him”, and then five minutes later he has 10. Great game by Wesley and we really needed that. As Denver was making their surge in the fourth quarter, Wesley put a stop to it has he drilled a three from the top of the key to silence the Denver crowd. A big game from him and it was fun to watch.
Joel Freeland continues to impress me. I honestly thought this guy was going to be bench fodder and would eventually be a part of a trade package, but I guess not. Freeland ended with 5 points on just 1-for-7 shooting, but he also had 7 rebounds, 4 of those were offensive. This new Joel I could like.
Now some quick concerns that I saw. Denver missed a whopping 14 free-throws tonight. You would figure we would blow them out right? Well, the final score says that, but during the run that Denver made in the fourth, it seemed like we could not put the foot on their throat and put them away. We started taking bad shots and Denver was getting to the line. Fortunately, they were missing an abnormal amount of them (Andre Miller missed 3 free-throws for crying out loud). This still has a concerning air to it. If this had been the Chicago Bulls or the Los Angeles Clippers, we would have been in trouble. More experienced teams would have capitalized on our mistakes and made us pay. We got lucky tonight, but fortunately we also found a way to stop the bleeding and in a big way.
Overall, this was a way better game than the one in Phoenix and I think this showed more the type of team that we have. It was great to see the bench being able to extend the lead rather than actually helping the other team score points like last season. There seemed to be chemistry and it felt like this team finally woke up and realized it was the regular season. Good! Let’s keep it up. Next game is the home opener against the San Antonio Spurs tomorrow night at 7:00 PM PST. It will be nice to see the Portland crowd again and I hope we can come out with the win. We seem to match up well against the Spurs, but it will not be easy.