Portland Trail Blazers’ Season Finale a Backdrop for Coaching Question

The Portland Trail Blazers lost to the Golden State Warriors, 103-86, in a snoozer Friday — the first leg of a two-game homestand to close out the regular season. Considering Portland’s nonexistent stakes at this stage of the season, these last two games feel like a tedious sideshow to a more significant guessing game going on behind the scenes:

Are the Blazers going to bring back head coach Chauncey Billups or let him walk?

The Blazers have been eliminated from postseason contention. General manager Joe Cronin signed his multi-year extension on Monday. Besides some slight variance in Portland’s NBA Draft Lottery positioning, Billups’ future with the franchise is the last meaningful thing to sort out. With this being the fourth and final guaranteed year of Billups’ contract (Portland has a team option for the fifth season), his future has been in limbo all season. But the speculation has grown much more potent now that an answer is seemingly coming right around the corner.

Plus, it grew all the more potent Friday morning when long-time Oregon sportswriter Dwight Jaynes reported Billups is likely to return next season with a multi-year contract extension.

Friday evening, prior to the Blazers’ loss to the Warriors, Billups essentially got to make the case for himself when a reporter asked the head coach to give a self-assessment of his work this season.

“I think that I’ve also taken a lot of strides this year with this team,” Billups said. “Having the opportunity to compete pretty much all the way to the end has given me some incredible experiences and games that I know I’ve learned a lot from. … I think by and large, the biggest thing that any coach wants to really do is to create their culture. I think this year more than any year, when you look at our team, I think they kinda embody my personality now. So I thought we all as a group, myself included, just came a long way and got better. We all had a long way to go, we still have a long way to go, but it’s been a successful season.”

Billups was also asked why the team pushed hard for wins down the stretch run of the season considering the incentive to increase lottery odds by collecting more losses. The coach philosophized about fate, before asserting his identity as a winner.

“I just believe you can’t control fate,” Billups said. “It’s more important for me as the head coach, at least, it was really important for me to keep trying to establish the winner that I am. I think when my guys understand that and they know that, they start to replicate that.”

Billups has coached the Blazers to a 116-211 record in his four seasons at the helm. His tenure has overlapped with tremendous roster upheaval, especially following the trade of franchise superstar Damian Lillard in the 2023 offseason.

The Blazers head into their regular season finale against the Los Angeles Lakers Sunday afternoon with a 35-46 record.

More Notes

— Also at Friday’s pregame presser, Billups explained why he subbed out starters Shaedon Sharpe and Toumani Camara for all of overtime during Portland’s 133-126 road loss to the Utah Jazz on Wednesday.

“Minutes restriction,” Billups said for the reasoning. “We did it about two or three times over the last couple games of that little [road] trip as well.”

Billups didn’t specify the limit on the minutes restriction, but Sharpe played 35 minutes against Utah, while Camara played 33 minutes. Billups clarified that Portland’s 118-113 loss to the Chicago Bulls on April 4 was one instance over that recent five-game road trip where he had players on minutes restrictions. Both Deni Avdija and Sharpe got subbed out with three minutes left in that game when Portland trailed by five points. They each had logged 35 minutes.