-
Tim BontempsESPN
LAKE BUENA VISTA, Fla. – After Portland Trail Blazers star Damian Lillard got up and hit a 3-pointer while he was furious to put Portland ahead by two with 2:53 left in the fourth quarter of Sunday night’s game against the Philadelphia 76ers , he turned around and looked at the scoreboard.
“I just remember looking up there because I wanted to get to the point where we took the lead and then just hold the lead instead of playing backwards. Because that’s not uncomfortable to be,” you are two. If they score, they can go up 5 if they make a shot. ‘
“So I just looked up, ‘OK, let’s get away from them now. Let’s end the game. Let’s stop messing with our season.’ That’s really what I was thinking when I looked up. Like, ‘Okay. Let’s do this.’ “
Lillard did just that. After missing two free throws and a potential game-bound 3-pointer in the final 20 seconds of Saturday’s loss to the LA Clippers, he responded by scoring 51 points while adding seven assists in 40 minutes to give the Blazers to a 124-121 victory over the Sixers in the NBA bubble at the Walt Disney World Resort.
With the victory, Portland moved within a half game of the Memphis Grizzlies – who had previously lost Sunday to the Toronto Raptors – to eighth place in the Western Conference and eliminated the New Orleans Pelicans and Sacramento Kings – who both lost – of controversy for a place in the league’s first play-in tournament.
It looked for a significant stretch of the fourth quarter, as Portland could suffer a disappointing loss to an underrated opponent for a second day in a row. After the loss to the Clippers with Kawhi Leonard resting for the entire game and Paul George on the bench in the dying moments, the Sixers – already without star Ben Simmons due to an injury to the left knee – lost Joel Embiid six minutes in the match due to a left ankle injury.
However, the Blazers saw their offense stagnate thanks to tired legs in the second half, and the Sixers – led by 28 points from Josh Richardson – made a pressure and took a 114-108 lead on a Richardson 3-pointer with 4:23 left. left.
Portland responded with 12 unanswered points over the next two minutes – covered by seven straight points from Lillard on the one-and-3 pointer and a pull-up triple on the next possession – which gave the Blazers the lead for good. and allowed Lillard to jump back from Saturday’s disappointment.
“I don’t think anyone thinks any less of Dame because he misses free throws,” said Blazers coach Terry Stotts. “Tonight he showed his determination and wants to show that he has shown throughout his career.
“I don’t think anyone was worried about how he was going to come out and play tonight.”
The same could be said for center Jusuf Nurkic, who gave the Blazers 15 points and six rebounds in 29 minutes while playing in the first back-to-back games where he has played since returning from the gruesome leg injury he had last season.
“I was not prepared for the back-to-back,” said Nurkic, who said he decided to play after Hassan Whiteside was ruled out for a second straight game due to a hip injury. “After that loss, I could not afford not to play. So I tried to fight, and I’m glad we won these. We know our season is over now, and we can no longer afford to lose.”
The Blazers have two games left: Tuesday against the Dallas Mavericks and Thursday against the Brooklyn Nets. If Portland wins both, it will be guaranteed a spot in the play-in tournament, which begins at 2:30 p.m. Saturday on ABC.
Thanks to Lillard’s heroes, he was able to both erase Saturday’s disappointment and move Portland one win closer to the goal of making the most of this opportunity by making the playoffs, a goal that Lillard set for the Blazers before they arrived in Florida.
“After the game, I got annoyed with myself,” Lillard said. “I was frustrated. But it’s what it is. I talked to one of my best friends, and he was, ‘This happened for a reason. You’ve had a lot of great moments, and you usually come out on top … “You have to expect that there will be some kind of balance. You have to expect that sometimes you will have to react to some kind of contradiction.”
“I had a chance to get back in court today, so I’m moved out.”
A small part of the victory was Carmelo Anthony, one of the best scorers in NBA history, who passed John Havlicek and Paul Pierce and moved up to 15th place on the NBA’s highest scoring list. Anthony said it’s not something he’ll be celebrating right now because Portland is fighting for a playoff spot and NBA players are putting pressure on people to end racial inequality and promote social justice.
“Well, first it’s an honor, and I’m blessed I can still do it,” Anthony said postgame. “To reach that top 15, I would not take it as applicable. Some great ones there.
“[But] it’s kind of hard to celebrate that right now. I appreciate it … it’s a great milestone. I do not want to downplay it. [But] it’s very difficult to hear about it and talk about it when you’re still in this dogfight, because there’s so much we need to achieve. “
.
