Sports Hey PDX January 7, 2025 0 Comments

Guards Giveth, Taketh Away as Blazers Lose Close One to Pistons

The Portland Trail Blazers almost pulled off back-to-back road wins on Monday night, taking Cade Cunningham and the Detroit Pistons down to the wire before falling 118-115. The game featured torrid shooting from both backcourts plus a fair amount of up-and-down play. In the end, the Pistons made one extra possession count, enough to make the difference.

The loss takes Portland’s record to 12-23 on the season, 4-15 away from home.

Here are some of the factors that contributed to the outcome.

Inside Game

When the Blazers succeeded, they made this game about inside play. Deni Avdija wasn’t just fast in the midsection of the court, which is his default, but down the lane against a slightly-slow Pistons defense. He led the charge, but Deandre Ayton and the rest of the Blazers followed cutting, passing, rebounding, and generally attacking the paint. They ended up with 50 points inside, a healthy number.

Paint dominance was enough to earn Portland a 60-51 halftime lead, but towards the end of the first half and into the second, they got away from their foundation. It started ironically, with Anfernee Simons and Shaedon Sharpe hitting a ton of three-pointers. Simons would finish 8-12 from distance for the game, which was huge. Sharpe shot a respectable 3-7 on threes. But that began a trend of drifting outside. When jumpers stopped falling, Portland’s one-time 22-point lead shrunk farther and farther until it was a ballgame.

In a parallel story, Portland did a good job early containing the Pistons in the paint. Detroit would find the ball surrounded by three defenders within six feet of the rim. But the Pistons went to a drive-and-dish game, turning Portland’s interior enthusiasm against them.

Threes

Which brings us to our next point. The Blazers shot a phenomenal 16-35, 45.7%, from long range. Detroit didn’t even come close to matching at 34.9%. But in real numbers, the Pistons hit 15 threes against Portland’s 16. That made the game tighter than one would expect. This is one of the few times all season that the Blazers have gone nuclear from distance but failed to snag the W. It was a case of modern NBA offense: quantity can beat—or in this case, match—quality.

Transition Defense

Once again Portland’s defense looked like Swiss Cheese when the pace quickened tonight. This has been a chronic problem for the last month. Detroit scored 20 on the break. The Blazers nearly matched them with 19, but the offensive effort was semi-wasted when Portland gave the transition points right back. The Pistons also scored plenty on the semi-break, in the first half of the shot clock. When the Blazers were set on defense they looked good. They just didn’t get the chance often enough.

Turnovers told a similar story. The final tally read Portland 16, Detroit 15. But the Pistons scored 26 off of Portland’s turnovers, as many were of the live-ball variety. Portland only got 14 points off of Detroit’s mistakes.

Clingan Defense

Donovan Clingan played 13 minutes with 4 points and 5 rebounds, a modest stat line. But don’t miss how Clingan contributes to Portland’s stout interior defense when he’s in. He allowed the Blazers to pack the lane less while still retaining defensive integrity inside.

The Pistons kicking out, as mentioned above, was an asterisk. Also Detroit pulled Clingan to the arc by letting Isaiah Stewart shoot over him. But that’s an opposing center taking threes instead of an opposing star. Stewart shot 0-3 from distance. In other words, the results may not be airtight, but there’s reasons to love what Clingan brings.

Up and Down Guards

Anfernee Simons and Shaedon Sharpe were blistering hot in this game. Simons shot 14-21 overall for 36 points, adding 9 assists. Sharpe kept plugging away, inside and out, finishing with 20 on 8-17 shooting with 8 rebounds and 8 assists. It was as good of an outing as you could ever want from the big backcourt duo.

Simons hit a game-saving three with 12 seconds remaining to bring the Blazers within two, 115-117. Unfortunately he also coughed up a turnover on the final possession of the game with the Blazers in position to tie the score. He was isolated above the arc when Malik Beasley just picked him. It was a tough ending to an otherwise impressive outing.

Also to the debit side of the ledger: Cade Cunningham scored 32 on 11-23 shooting, Tim Hardaway, Jr. 26 shooting 10-15. Plenty of those points, especially Hardaway’s, came from a slow-responding perimeter defense from the Blazers. Sharpe and Simons weren’t the only culprits. Scoot Henderson did not look good defensively in this game. But the starters didn’t help as much as they could have.