The Portland Trail Blazers and their fans are celebrating tonight in the aftermath of a 118-108 victory over the championship-contending Oklahoma City Thunder. For those counting, that’s the second win in a row for Portland over their Western Conference foes. Admittedly, the Thunder are injured, missing wing Jalen Williams and center Chet Holmgren. But the Blazers are playing without guards Ja Morant and Shaedon Sharpe, so they don’t care much about the Oklahoma City medical list. The accomplishment
is still significant, and a heck of a lot better than losing.
Deni Avdija led Portland with 28 points on 9-20 shooting, adding 6 assists and 4 steals. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander paced the Thunder with 31.
Threes
Three-point shots have been critical to the Blazers all season long. If they planned to swear off them tonight, they fell off the wagon. 10 out of Portland’s first 11 shots came from deep. The good news: many of them fell. The bad news: even when accurate, deep shooting led to an early 23-14 deficit. The margin wasn’t critical—or anywhere close to it—that early in the game, but it did serve notice that they better find another aspect to their attack. It literally wasn’t possible for Portland to shoot well enough to “three” themselves to victory.
Fortunately, the Blazers diversified as the game wound onward. They finally got their drives going, creating actual space at the arc instead of just relying on troubled deep shots for everything. A sweet flurry of triples at the end of the first half served as a reprise, but it was generally helpful. Portland took a 56-50 lead into intermission.
Whatever lessons Portland learned from the first two quarters, they promptly forgot in the third. Once again they opened up a barrage of distance shots. Once again they lost ground despite hitting several of them. But the fourth quarter was all grit (and a few free throws, as we’ll describe later). Much as had happened at the end of the second period, the Blazers saved their threes for an opportune close-out to the period. They became the icing on the cake instead of the cake itself, the plate underneath it, the doily underneath the plate, the table underneath the doily, and the foundation of the whole damn house.
The Blazers ended up 19-49 from behind the arc for the evening. The Thunder went 11-36. I guess if you’re going to get into a long-distance shooting competition, Oklahoma City is a decent team to do it with.
Possession Ball
When they weren’t shooting threes, the Blazers were…well…not doing very well for much of the game. The key trouble lay in their inability to control the ball. They committed 18 turnovers after limiting themselves to just 9 all game last night. They allowed Oklahoma City 14 offensive rebounds. The commonality between those two factors: they kept Portland away from scoring opportunities and allowed extra ones to OKC. Like the three-point shooting, these trends began to even out as the game progressed, but the Blazers were playing with fire for a while. Portland attempted 81 shots on the evening, below their average. Oklahoma City shot 88 times.
Let’s Get Physical
The way Portland played defense tonight, it wouldn’t surprise me at all if the pregame song involved Olivia Newton-John in a leotard. If they couldn’t be the most skillful defenders in the league, they settled for becoming the most physical. The number of bumps, thumps, and the case of Robert Williams III, just plain elbows delivered to the face of opponents was astounding. (Hint: If hitting your opponent counts for defense, even offensive-minded guards become terrors. Literally anyone can do it!) Portland had the Thunder out of their game, not because they anticipated plays, but because they slammed them into insensibility. Uneven refereeing all evening opened the door and the Blazers barged right through.
The tactic was doubly effective because Oklahoma City doesn’t like to score from outside. Everything they do centers on shots from 15 feet and in. That brings more defenders, and more obstruction, into play. Under those conditions, a lot of Portland’s bump-and-grind approach went unimpeded.
This was a huge sign of a veteran team turning things their way using the tools at hand. It’s another mark of Portland’s adaptability, a feature of the 2026-27 squad that’s been missing for several years. If they keep up this kind of evolution, it’s not impossible for them to become dangerous in the playoffs.
Knotty, Knotty
Alexander the Great is famous for solving the unresolvable Gordian Knot problem by taking his sword and cutting the tangle in two. Tonight the knot struck back—and basically won—as Portland defended Shai Gilgeous-Alexander the Great. Did you read that section on physicality above? Nobody had a bigger target on their back than SGA.
First of all, the Blazers didn’t settle for single-covering Shai, even with their best defenders. As soon as the MVP put the ball on the floor and made any progress towards the bucket, Portland swarmed him. And you can bet that somebody in that duo (or trio, or occasional quartet) of defenders was making bodily contact. The Blazers didn’t stop Gilgeous-Alexander, but they tied him up and punished him like this was 50 Shades of Shai.
Oklahoma City’s superstar finished the game with 31 on 9-20 shooting. He is who he is. His moves were impressive, particularly in a third-quarter flurry when he loaded his team on his back and carried them uphill. They just weren’t determinative. He had only 2 assists. He hit 0 threes in 7 attempts. That’s good enough for Portland. Well done.
Clingan v. Hartenstein
In the game between these two teams last night, the battle came down to Gilgeous-Alexander versus Portland star Damian Lillard. Tonight’s battle was just as tough, just not as high-profile. Centers Isaiah Hartenstein and Donovan Clingan went AT it. Arms, elbows, bodies, and sweat all flew underneath the rims at both ends. It was like watching a pair of elk lock horns, scary and majestic at the same time. Clingan gave as good as he got from his veteran counterpart.
In the end, DC finished with 5 points, 3 blocks, and 12 rebounds. Hartenstein netted 20 points, 11 rebounds, and 6 assists on 10-14 shooting, marred only by 6 turnovers (which Clingan had a hand in). The rebounding struggle between the two was just epic, but no more so than Clingan’s defensive stands every time Hartenstein put an offensive move on in the lane. Way to go, Mr. Clingan.
There was a brief corresponding battle between Blazers center Robert Williams III and OKC rookie Aday Mara, but as mentioned above, Williams ended that quickly with what amounted to referee-sanctioned mugging. Welcome to the league, Rook. Here’s the Bactine and Band-Aids.
New World in the Fourth
The permissive reffing we’ve mentioned so far disappeared in the final period. The final 12 minutes of this game resembled a Brazilian Mardi Gras parade, with a never-ending progression of whistles and foul shots for both teams. The teams combined for 26 free throws in the fourth period out of 54 total for the game. That’s like dealing out half the deck of cards on the river. It was a lot, especially given the earlier trends of:
- No harm, no foul.
- Harm? Still no foul.
Portland finally broke the grind-it-out fourth period pattern with, you guessed it, a couple of threes, plus an absolutely stout defensive stand against Gilgeous-Alexander with a little over two minutes remaining in the game. That one bit of brilliance by Toumani Camara and company forced a 24-second violation from OKC that allowed the Blazers to push their lead to 8 and put the game away. It’s funny how, after six thousand up-and-down plays, the whole evening can rotate around one moment. But that’s the beauty of NBA basketball.
Damian Lillard did a great job of closing out the fourth when the game was in doubt. He finished the game with 18 points. That’s two games in a row where his hand weighed heavy. The man ain’t just decoration.
Up Next
Boxscore
The Blazers visit the Sacramento Kings on Friday night for the second NBA Cup game of the season. The action starts at 7:00 PM, Pacific.
