The Portland Trail Blazers played with the wrong type of fire Friday night at the Moda Center. In the end, they got burned, falling 100-93 to the Dallas Mavericks (now 24-50) in a crucial game in the Western Conference Play-In race.
It was a Portland performance typified by 24 turnovers, 10 missed free throws, two injuries, poor shooting, and slow starts to the first and fourth quarters. To sum it up in a word: Sloppy.
“We started the game poorly with not enough sense of urgency,” Blazers head coach
Tiago Splitter said. “We got better throughout the game. … But offensively we were very poor. We didn’t make shots, turned over the ball all over. … We didn’t have it offensively.”
Even with all the turnovers and sub-40% shooting from the field, the Blazers still had a chance to win the game late. That was because Portland’s defense was much better than the offense, and the Mavs were shooting poorly themselves. But after the Blazers tied the game at 92-92 with 2:25 remaining, the same old problems did them in. Donovan Clingan missed a golden look in the paint, Deni Avdija committed a crucial turnover and the Blazers never made another field goal as Dallas closed out the game on an 8-1 run.
“It’s disappointing,” Avdija said. “I feel like we could’ve won that game.”
“It was a little slow. It was a little muddy out there from the beginning of the game,” added Blazers forward Jerami Grant, who exited the game early alongside veteran center Robert Williams III (more on that later). “We tried to get it back a few times. We weren’t as consistent as we should be, especially playing teams like this.”
Dallas super rookie Cooper Flagg finished with 24 points, but Mavs big man Marvin Bagley III was the biggest thorn in Portland’s side with 26 points and nine rebounds on 11-14 shooting. On the Blazers’ side, Jrue Holiday scored a team-high 23 points while Avdija and Grant added 20 and 19, respectively. But no other Blazer reached double figures. Clingan played one of his most frustrating games of the season, even while posting 17 rebounds, and reserve guard Scoot Henderson struggled mightily.
Among the struggles Portland displayed Friday, the turnovers were the most pervasive, marking just the latest lowlight in a nightmare season for ball security. The Blazers average the most turnovers in the NBA with 17.5 per game. The gap of 1.5 turnovers between the 30th-ranked Blazers and the 29th-ranked Brooklyn Nets is wider than the gap between the Nets and the 14th-ranked Phoenix Suns. Even during Portland’s blowout wins this week over the Nets and Milwaukee Bucks, they struggled to take care of the ball; they just played well enough in other areas to paper over the mistakes, especially because the competition was weaker. However, playing against a better opponent Friday, with so much else going wrong offensively, turnovers hung the Blazers out to dry.
Avdija and Clingan both turned the ball over five times apiece. Holiday registered four. Henderson posted three in just 22 minutes. It seemed every chance the Blazers had to make a move or gain momentum, they squandered it with a wayward pass out of bounds, helping the Mavs score 33 points off turnovers.
“The turnovers,” Avdija said about what Portland needed to do better. “The turnovers. The damn turnovers.”
“We’re showing film. We’re trying to organize,” Splitter added. “In a certain way, we need to play fast to try to take their defense a little bit out of the spot, but [the turnovers are] just biting us in the behind. Playing slow is also not a question. We also turn over the ball when we play halfcourt. So we just gotta get better.”
To add insult to injury — or injury to insult — Portland lost two key veterans early against Dallas because of injuries. Williams’ night ended late in the second quarter due to a lower back issue while Grant went back to the locker room after the third quarter following a non-contact right calf injury. When a Henderson steal initiated a fast break with about 20 seconds left in the quarter, Grant planted his foot to start running down the court and then came out of the step hobbling.
Grant’s injury appears to be the more significant of the two, and he’s slated to undergo testing on Saturday.
“Jerami felt a pop in his calf,” said Splitter, adding that his level of concern about the injury was at 100%.
“I’m always hopeful,” Grant added. “Like I said, I can put some pressure on it, so it shouldn’t be too crazy, God willing. So we’ll see.”
On top of the loss and the injuries, the Golden State Warriors and Los Angeles Clippers both picked up wins Friday night. That means the ninth-seeded Blazers sit just a half-game ahead of the Warriors in 10th and 1.5 games behind the Clippers in eighth with seven games left in the regular season. Portland losing a game due to a lack of execution and urgency — plus losing ground in the Play-In race — is especially disappointing considering Splitter had said on Wednesday the squad had amped up its focus for the postseason push.
All in all, Friday was a rough night in Rip City.
“Not great,” Splitter said about the team’s mood after the loss. “I think we all felt that we were in a growing moment, and this one hits hard. Like I said, offensively, we were not there, but also feeling the JG and Rob [injuries] hit hard.”
