On The Sideline with Andy Katz, Portland Trail Blazers guard Damian Lillard joined Weber State Men’s Basketball Head Coach Eric Duft to talk about Lillard’s new General Manager role with Weber State, his return to the Blazers, and other topics.
Dame started with his new role at Weber State and what the school means to him:
I think I’ve always had, you know, a true investment in the [Weber State] program because I’ve always acknowledged and known how important it was to my growth. As a young man coming
out of high school as a person and even as a player, just learning how to do things outside of myself and be a part of a program and what it meant to lead [and] be a part of a program… I feel like that is where the ties are, where the ties come from, and it’s something that I’ve wanted to stay connected to.
I didn’t play for a popular AAU program and we had a 9a.m. game in Dallas at this tournament. It was nobody in the gym. It was our team and their team and there was one coach there, and that was coach Ray, the head coach at Weber State at the time. And he offered me my first scholarship after that game. And during that time, you know, I was having a hard time because a lot of the coaches I couldn’t really tell if they were telling me the truth or if this was just like the the pitch that they gave to all the players.
Dame also talked about his genuine happiness with returning to the Portland Trail Blazers this offseason after being traded away at his request two years ago:
[Returning to Portland has] been great. You know, I’m not an overly expressive person, but I think in my adulthood, coming back here at this time, with the age of my kids, with where the team is, they’ve developed and grown over the last couple years. Being back where I’ve been for the first 11 years of my career. You know, this is one of the times where I feel I feel extremely happy. Every day I wake up and I’m thankful. I’m waking up seeing my kids, taking them to school, you know, I can just drive down to my mom’s house, it’s just a it’s a blessing, man. And I’m, you know, I couldn’t be happier.
Lillard continues to recover from an Achilles injury that bounced him from the 2025 Playoffs, and will likely return during the 2026-27 season.
