TUALATIN, Ore. — Before the Trail Blazers embark on a demanding five-game-in-seven-day road trip, they will face the Detroit Pistons Friday night at the Moda Center.
Following their latest win over a team in the Western Conference playoff picture, the Blazers are confident.
Heading into Thursday’s games the Blazers were just two games out of the second seed in the Western Conference.
“Why not?” Nicolas Batum said. “Try to go get it, yeah.”
What a difference a day makes.
After reviewing their defensive performance on Houston’s James Harden, the Blazers were still pleased.
“Pressuring him, getting into him, not letting him get a lot of clean looks,” coach Terry Stotts said about his team’s defense on one of the league’s leading MVP candidates. “He had some shots that you’d expect him to make. Being able to pressure him without fouling him is difficult to do and I think we did that.”
The Blazers also did an excellent job on the glass, out rebounding the Rockets 60-40.
The Rockets had 12 offensive rebounds and the Blazers also had 20 turnovers, so it wasn’t perfect. But Stotts was still pleased on the whole. However, the Blazers also know that they almost blew the game in the final 2½ minutes.
“The pressure, the turnovers were too much,” Batum said. “We got to correct that and transition defense. They got too many layups. We gotta get back on defense.”
One play generated a lot of controversy when Corey Brewer, who scored 17 points in less than four minutes in the fourth quarter, stole the ball from Damian Lillard in the final seconds. Brewer made a lay-up to make it one-point game with 15 seconds left but replays showed that Brewer clearly was grabbing Lillard’s right arm.
“Yeah he got fouled,” Stotts said. “I couldn’t tell during the game. I didn’t watch the scoreboard. But when I got back to my office, yeah, that was I think he got fouled.”
As shooting guard Wesley Matthews recovers from surgery, few Blazers had had direct contact with Matthews, but Stotts said he had texted with him.
With Matthews out, the adjustment with Arron Afflalo continues to be a point of focus. Afflalo took seven 3-pointers on Thursday, a Matthews-like volume. Stotts was more than okay with Afflalo taking a good chunk of 3-pointers even though only one fell.
“I want take as many good 3’s as we can” Stotts said. “If he’s open, he’s nearly a career 40 percent 3- point shooter. I thought all the 3’s he had last night were good.”
The Blazers have a big road trip ahead where only one team finds themselves decidedly out of the playoff picture.
The Pistons, despite injuries to key players and a big midseason trade, still has aspirations of sneaking into the Eastern Conference playoffs.
The Blazers played them back in early December just before they waived forward Josh Smith and went on a tear that put them back with in reach of the playoffs.
They traded for point guard Reggie Jackson from Oklahoma City but sent away productive players in DJ Augustin and Kyle Singler. With the Brandon Jennings suffering a torn achilles in January, it changed their fortunes.
They’ve lost eight straight and are six games back of the eight spot, which will be nearly impossible to come back from, even in the lowly East.
