The Portland Trail Blazers came into their Friday night matchup against the Sacramento Kings having won 8 of their last 11 games. Sacramento, on the other hand, owned 1 win in 10 tries. It’s not a terribly big surprise, then, that Portland handled the Kings fairly easily, developing a double-digit lead in the first half, then defending well enough to maintain it throughout. The 120-107 final score speaks of a professional, if perfunctory, effort on Portland’s part. Sacramento had moments in this
game but were never able to string enough of them together to make a difference.
Deni Avdija led the Blazers with 34 points. Damian Lillard added 29.
This easy win was all about field goal percentages. Sacramento isn’t known as a defensive powerhouse. They definitely weren’t tonight. The Blazers threatened 50% overall from the field most of the night, finishing at 48%. They also shot 40% from the three-point arc on 42 attempts, plus 29-31 from the foul line.
With shooting that good, all Portland had to do was not blow the defense. They gave up a few too many transition buckets, but that’s one of Sacramento’s few strong points. Otherwise they held the Kings to 45% shooting, played them even in the paint, and didn’t commit a ton of turnovers. Easy-peasy W.
Stay tuned in a little bit for extended analysis of the game, including tidbits we didn’t reference here!
Up Next
Boxscore
The Blazers get another tough test versus an injured opponent, traveling to Minnesota to face the Timberwolves in the first game of a back-to-back on Monday night at 5:00 PM, Pacific.
