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Blazers hope to bring show from the road to the Garden

Following a successful road trip, Portland faces Oklahoma City tonight

By Matt Calkins
Published: November 4, 2010, 12:00am

NEXT GAME

Thunder at Blazers, 7:30 p.m. today

TV: TNT (cable Ch. 54). Radio: FM 95.5

Tip-off for the home opener was yet to occur, and already questions about the road were swirling.

What do you think about starting with a game here and then going on a long road trip? Nate McMillan was asked two Tuesdays ago, approximately 75 minutes before the Blazers’ regular-season debut.

“You gotta play 82,” McMillan said. “I try to focus on the game in front of us and not get caught up in the schedule because there’s nothing we can do about it. It’s kind of a strange schedule.”

In football, they have three-and-out. The Blazers? They had one and out — a single home game followed by a four-game road trip that included two back-to-backs.

NEXT GAME

Thunder at Blazers, 7:30 p.m. today

TV: TNT (cable Ch. 54). Radio: FM 95.5

But given their success, some may wonder if they’re even happy to be back.

First there was a healthy win over the Clippers, then a squeak-out victory against the Knicks, then a drubbing at the hands of the Bulls, followed by a lopsided triumph over the Bucks.

That’s three Ws and one L on the road — a satisfactory record for any team in this league.

As a result, the Blazers shot up to No. 4 in ESPN’s NBA power rankings, sitting below only the Lakers, Heat and Celtics. ESPN analyst Chris Mullin also touted Portland’s prowess, praising the Blazers’ efforts while away from the Rose Garden and predicting a No. 2 seed in the Western Conference if Greg Oden and Joel Przybilla return.

But Portland isn’t exactly coming home to a welcome mat and balloons. Nope, it’s more like a fumigated house. Last year’s league-leading scorer, Kevin Durant, and his Oklahoma City Thunder come to the Rose Garden tonight — and he’s arguably the toughest player to guard for any defender in the league.

That said, Durant has not been overwhelmingly productive against the Blazers over the past couple years. He was 30 for 83 from the field in four games vs. Portland last season, and 27 for 68 the year before that — each total falling short of 40 percent.

There has been some speculation that the Blazers are particularly motivated to shut Durant down because the franchise passed on him in favor of the Oden in the 2007 draft, but it may just have something to do with solid defense.

Speaking of defense, LaMarcus Aldridge flashed a bit of D Tuesday against Milwaukee, collecting a career-high five blocked shots. The night before, he dropped a game-high 33 points on 12-of-19 shooting in a losing effort against the Bulls.

McMillan has been preaching Aldridge’s potential to dominate on “both ends of the floor,” and while the past few games offer an extremely small sample size … could it be possible the power forward is embracing those words?

The schedule does not get much easier after the Thunder. Two days later, the Blazers host Toronto, which is 1-3 following a 17-point loss Wednesday against Utah, but then it is back on the road to take on the two-time defending champion Lakers on Sunday.

And while beating the champs does not generally require any extra motivation, Portland has some anyway.

The team has dedicated its season to Maurice Lucas, the former Blazer great who died of cancer Sunday at the age of 58.

Matt Calkins can be contacted at 360-735-4528 or matt.calkins@columbian.com. To read his blog, go to columbian.com/weblogs/BlazerBanter

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