MLB Front Page
NBA Front Page
NHL Front Page
NFL Front Page
Portland Trailblazers
New Orleans Hornets rookie point guard Darren Collison had just made two free-throws. The Portland Trail Blazers lead was down to nine, and the crowd that groaned for the first three-plus quarters came alive. Then, the few thousand went silent again. Blazers forward LaMarcus Aldridge took the pass from point guard Andre Miller, faced up Emeka Okafor, then plowed into the Hornets center, brushed off the contact, felt Okafor’s hand slap his arm and, with pure strength, muscled in the nine-foot runner. He missed the free-throw, but Miller grabbed the rebound and passed the ball to Brandon Roy, who missed an attempted bank shot. Center Greg Oden grabbed the wild miss and made the ensuing layup. A four point possession–just how Portland drew it up. After a scare, they were in control, leading 76-63 with 6:41 left in the fourth, and after giving the Hornets faithful hope, sat them glumly back in their seats.
The game was hard on the eyes, but the first quarter was particularly difficult to watch. New Orleans, having fired head coach Byron Scott, welcomed General Manager Jeff Bower to the bench. The team was in disarray, and looked completely out of sorts trying to adapt to their new coach. Scott’s Princeton style offense was replaced by a discombobulated, depressing, and jump-shot laden style.
Portland’s offense was the same: just awful. Aldridge scored four points early for Portland, and his counterpart, David West, did the same. They weren’t heard from again in the period as both teams settled for ill-advised, low-percentage jumpers that were continually missed, and missed badly.
After the early production by Aldridge and West, what energy either team showed were in the form of bench players: Hornets’ rookie shooting guard Marcus Thornton and Blazers’ second-year point guard Jerryd Bayless. The score was 9-6 in Portland’s favor when Bayless, fresh into the game, drove in for a layup with just over two minutes remaining in the first quarter. Finally a team was in double figures. Thornton helped New Orleans join them and escape further embarrassment by making a layup with fourteen seconds, keep his Hornets from from posting single digits in the quarter. Bayless drove once more, drawing a foul on Collison, then made two free-throws. Thornton followed by beating the buzzer with an explosive driving layup.
Their late jolts were much needed, but couldn’t overshadow the reality of how poorly the quarter was played. The Blazers scored 14 points. The Hornets scored 12 points. The Blazers shot 4-20 from the field. The Hornets shot 6-26 from the field. In all, an unsightly 10-46 shooting and 26 points in 12 minutes.
Play picked up in the second; it couldn’t get much worse. Bayless and Thorton were behind it again. Bayless made a layup, driving when no other Blazers would; everyone else was taking jump shots. Whereas he was solely looking to attack, Thornton combined aggressiveness with a slick, gunslinger’s mentality. He nailed a three-pointer to begin the second quarter, made a layup, and then pulled up for a mid-range jumper. He had eleven points in four minutes; Bayless had seven points in five minutes.
After Hornets disgruntled star guard Chris Paul, who entered the game averaging 26 points per game on 62 percent shooting, scored his first point of the game by making a free-throw with a minute and a half left in the second, Portland finished the quarter strong. Joel Przybilla, upon entering for Oden, made a layup from Roy, who then in turn drained a six-footer and the free-throw that ensued. Travis Outlaw tipped in a missed three-pointer by Roy at the buzzer to give the Blazers a 37-33 halftime lead. The margin was satisfying, not only because they finished the quarter on a 7-1 run to obtain it, but also because a four-point advantage against such a dreadful Hornets team was equivalent to a much larger cushion.
New Orleans continued to struggle in the third, while Portland turned on the jets and finally feasted on their opponents mediocrity. Aldridge reappeared, hitting a jumper to begin the period and four more on consecutive possessions later as the Blazers ran the pick-and-roll to perfection. His fourth in succession gave Portland a fourteen-point lead, a lead that grew to sixteen after Oden made a tip-shot and Przybilla hit four free-throws. This trio of big men ruled the second half, and this production was just the start. To go along with their brilliant play, the Blazers were helped considerably by an eerie case of dejá vú.
On February 3rd against Portland, Paul collapsed to the ground in agony after pulling up lame with 1:30 left in the third quarter. He left with a strained groin, and the Blazers battled back from a seventeen-point deficit to win. Tonight, with the crowd buzzing, Paul found Hilton Armstrong cutting to the basket. Armstrong dunked, cutting the deficit to ten, but Paul, coming down after making the jump-pass, had landed on Przybilla’s foot, and turned his ankle squeamishly. He writhed in pain, just as before, clutching his ankle. After a few minutes discussing the pain with the team doctor and the rearranged coaching staff, he hobbled off the floor, putting no pressure on the injured leg.
The Hornets had little hope before the injury, and only the slightest amount afterwards. All chances of coming back ended with the Aldridge jumper that extended the lead from nine to eleven and the put-back by Oden that increased it to thirteen. Including this decisive four-point spurt, the twosome along with Przybilla combined to score 11 points in the fourth quarter and tally a dominating line of 31 points, 19 rebounds, and 4 blocks in the second half alone.
The trio couldn’t help the Blazers notch their fifth straight double-digit win, as Collison went on a late run to make the final score, 86-78, respectable, but they did propel the team to a victory that was ugly to start and impressive to finish.
Loading ...
