12/26/11 Blazers vs Sixers Game Thread.......

Felton really choked at the end with his silly turnovers and missing at the FT line. I hope it doesn't become a trend. This Blazer team displayed the same problem the prior versions have, they can't put teams away.

 

We did put the team away. They lost. Ask Philly. They're the ones that didn't put US away.

 

I think you've been following the NBA long enough to know what it means to "put someone away".

 

This Sixers team has been playing together quite a long time. With only two pre-season games under their collective belts, I think the Blazers deserve a bit more time before we start labeling them.

 

I thought Portland did put them away. When you have a 15 point lead in the fourth, you've pretty much done the job of putting them away. Unless they make an insane number of three pointers. Which is what they did. If the other team makes a ridiculous number of three pointers, it's basically impossible to put them away.

I don't think Portland gave up anything. The Sixers clawed their way back into it. They earned the right to hold their heads up with a close loss instead of the blowout they were headed for.

 

Then you also do not know what the term means. The cut the lead to 3 late in the game and had a chance to send it to OT. That is not "putting a team away".

Putting a team away means that you end the game with a comfortable lead and they don't have a realistic shot to win.

 

I'm surprised Collins didn't use Vucevic at all. That guy was playing well in Europe during the lockout

 

Haha! This place never changes. Nice 1-0 start by my boys. Would have liked to have seen LA play a little less and Nic play a little more though.

 

We won't be able to sustain such heavy minutes from our starters like we did tonight. Eventually our bench will need to step it up. For an opening night game, I'm glad to see that write came out with the W.

 

Totally agree; tough loss tonight. These games count for more because there are fewer. I really hate to say it but I'm afraid we'll be 0-2 by theirs time tomorrow. You can kiss HCA goodbye after that.

 

We won. They lost.

 

I thought Felton did a good job overall running the offense; Crawford not so good; hopefully that'll get better as the team jells. Would be nice if Felton could add lob pass to his repertoire.

They still don't know how to run a fast break; there were two 3on2's that they got nothing from. Not a surprise because you don't teach the fast break by shortening the shot clock in practice. Would have been nice if they had hired Terry Porter as an assistant when he was available.

Still aren't using Wallace on offense; only saw once when he got the ball on the move coming around a pick. He didn't score; surprisingly Hawes anticipated and got over there; but if we practiced this i think Wallace would known to pass off to the guy who Hawes left.

Batum played lousy defense first half; he watches the ball too much and loses his man.

Everybody worked hard; we deserved to win. Obviously we could be a lot better.

 

We scored 107 points against a good Philadelphia defense. Sure we faltered a little down the stretch, but we got the W. This was the first game, we still need to get the kinks out. Everybody relax. We gotta focus on the Kings tomorrow. They just beat LA, so we may have our work cut out for us. Go Blazers!!

 

Some of you seem to want to pretend that we didn't fall apart at the end of the game.

 

Over all it was a fun game to watch. Not to use a Sheed Cliche' but both teams played really hard. It was not pretty, but both teams for flying all over the place for loose balls. The offensive fouls got out of hand, but I thought the intensity was excellent for a regular season game.

 

yes we made bonehead plays but williams went nuts from 3 and so did iggy.

thats more the story

 

I agree you have to give their shooters credit for making all those clutch threes. We should also fault our guys for not doing a better job of taking away the three. I wouldn't fault anyone too much for the first game of the season though, after a long vacation and a shortened training camp/preseason.

I also agree with UKRAINFAN re the failure to coach how to run a fast break. It would be interesting to see some old tape and find out if Nate even knows how to do it.

 

BTW, with 97 FGAs, POR had the most out of any other team in the league so far. A lot of it attributed to O-rebs, but still, that's a lot of possessions to work with.

During Nate's tenure, the team has scored at least 107 pts, while shooting below 41.2% only 5 times in regulation.

http://bkref.com/tiny/TzAdL

 

The crowd was great last night.
I wish Brandon Roy would have been there on the bench with the team.

 

When the Blazers are "nursing a lead" late in a game, they also have a habit of getting out of the way and watching the opposing guards sprint to the hoop for jam. I don't understand how this strategy is beneficial? If you've been holding a team to under 50% shooting, isn't it better to play defense and attempt to stop them from scoring? Or step in front of them and take the charge? At least they only allowed the Sixers to do this 1-2 times.

Not much you can do about guys jacking up long 3s though. Still, Felton had some very silly plays at the end, and the Blazers petered out offensively. They just did not close the game well.