Exclusive GAME# 56: BLAZERS @ KINGS - FEBRUARY 9, 2018 - Official NBA Quote Book

Portland Trail Blazers (31-25) vs. Sacramento Kings (17-37)

Damian Lillard scores 50 points in three quarters as the Portland Trail Blazers defeat the Sacramento Kings 118-100.

Lillard’s 50 points through three quarters marks the third time this season a player has scored at least 50 points in just three quarters. Lillard joins his teammate CJ McCollum and James Harden as McCollum did so on Jan. 31 vs. Chicago and Harden did so on Nov. 5 vs. Utah.

Lillard shot 16-of-26 from the field and 8-of-13 from three. At half, Lillard scored 28 points on 8-of-11 and 5-of-6 from three.

In the third quarter, Lillard scored 22 points and scored 15 of the Trail Blazers final 17 points to end the third.

The half total (28 points) and third quarter only (22 points) total for Lillard are both season-highs given up by the Kings for an opponent.

Sacramento trimmed a 12-point third quarter lead to 74-75 with 4:25 left in the quarter before the Trail Blazers finished the third on a 17-0 run.

The Kings spread out their scoring as all five starters scored in double-figures, which is the first occurrence of the season. Friday night also marked the fifth time that the Kings have ended a game with at least seven scorers in double figures and the first time since Jan. 6 vs. Den.

Willie Cauley-Stein led the team with 19 points on 8-of-14 shooting. De’Aaron Fox scored 13 points to go along with a career-high seven rebounds and a game-high nine assists.

Buddy Hield scored all of his 16 points in the fourth quarter as he hit 5-of-6 three’s. The five threes tie a season-high for three-point makes in a quarter with Garrett Temple who did so at PHX on Oct. 23.

 

KINGS HEAD COACH DAVE JOERGER:

“Tough night. Damian Lillard was fantastic – I thought we did a super job on him in the fourth quarter, where we held him scoreless. He got it going and I thought our bigs did a great job of being up in a lot of the pick-and-rolls, a place where we’re getting better at, but it was just too much of him. We can’t come out of the gate giving up 33 points in a quarter. Especially on your own end, you’re trying to start the game with some defensive force on a team that’s playing the second night of a back-to-back. It was a good experience, if you want to call it that, for our young guys – for our rookies. Those are tough covers, but welcome to the NBA – you’re going to get Steph Curry and then Dennis Smith Jr. and you’re going to get guys like Jeff Teague who is a very, very good point guard,. You’re going to get Dennis Smith again and then Chris Paul. There’s not a lot of difference – they’re all pretty good and it is the way of the NBA. So, keep getting better and we can do a better job closing out on the three-point line – continues to be an issue. I know that we’re smaller at a lot of those positions, but guys are just facing us and shooting over the top of us. It’s something that we can continue to work on and get better.”

ON WHAT HE TELLS SOME OF THE GUYS THAT ARE TRYING TO CONTAIN DAMIAN LILLARD

“Do better. he’s a tough cover so you’ve got to try to do some different things to him – pick him up, get him in different areas of the court. You’ve got to go at him and attack him, you’ve got to try to screen him. I didn’t ever see it like that in Memphis – it’s the same defensive system. Guys will get better, bigger, longer, faster, stronger and more experienced as time goes on.”

ON WHAT HE SAYS TO THE TEAM WITH THREE ROAD GAMES AHEAD BEFORE ALL-STAR BREAK

“We have had tremendous leadership the last two years from Garrett Temple – probably one of my favorite guys of all time. One of the best professional mindsets that I’ve been around and he does a fantastic job talking to guys. Vince [Carter] and Zach [Randolph] and Kosta [Koufos] as well. So the young guys, they’ve got to fight through and hold on to the rope.”

 

KINGS GUARD De’AARON FOX:

ON HOW TOUGH IT WAS TONIGHT ON DAMIAN LILLARD

“He just had it going. We brought it back in the third quarter and then they just went on a run that we couldn’t answer.”


ON IF THERE WAS ANYTHING THEY COULD DO TO STOP LILLARD

“Nah, I mean they just kept running a high ball-screen and he came off and shot it or he just came off and made a play. When a guard [has] got it going like that, a guy like that is tough to stop. You just try to contain him.”

ON IF HE CAN LEARN ANYTHING FROM LILLARD’S PERFORMANCE

“Somebody making shots, he’s making shots. Of course it’s difficult every night, especially playing this position. But when somebody is making shots like that, aint much you can do.”

ON LOOKING FORWARD TO ALL STAR BREAK AFTER UPCOMING ROAD TRIP

“It’s cool to get away, cool to just take a little break. We just want to come back after the break and finish the season strong.”

ON APPROACHING THE UPCOMING ROAD TRIP FEATURING TOUGH POINT GUARD MATCHUPS

“Just be ready to play. Like I said, we had Steph [Curry] in here not too many nights ago, we had Dennis [Smith Jr] right after that and Dame [Lillard] right now. It’s a gauntlet going throughout the year playing point guard so you’ve just got to prepare for every game.”

 

KINGS FORWARD GARRETT TEMPLE:

ON LILLARD’S PERFORMANCE

“He’s a hell of a player; an All-Star averaging 25. He got it going early. I think he had 10 in the first eight minutes of the game and it was just downhill from there. Our bigs honestly did a pretty good job of being up, but he hit some tough shots. Deep threes the couple times we went under the screens and then in the second half it was a lot of downhill drives. Once the bigs got up he started splitting us, so just getting downhill and that’s a tough cover for anybody. It’s nights like that where a guy gets off. But I think we let go of the rope at the end of the second quarter.”

ON IF THEY COULD HAVE CHANGED UP THE DEFENSIVE LOOKS MORE

“I think maybe we should have trapped a little more and a little more aggressive. I think we were more aggressive than we were at the beginning of the game, but that’s when he started splitting and getting to the rack. We threw a couple different things at him, but he made threes early on and then he got layups in the second half because we were getting a little higher. It’s kind of a pick your poison. You want to run him off the line but he’s also a great finisher in the lane too.”

ON WHAT THE TEAM IS GETTING IN THE ACQUISITION OF IMAN SHUMPERT

“A defender. A guy that can guard three, maybe even four positions on the court. A guy that’s been in this league for a while and understands how to win. I think we’ve got to get him healthy, but we’re getting a guy that knows how to play the game and really defends on the perimeter. Its always good to have guys that can defend. We haven’t been a good defensive team this year. So, it’s always good to have guys that can defend on the perimeter.”

 

BLAZERS HEAD COACH TERRY STOTTS:

ON THE TEAM GETTING THE ENERGY THEY NEEDED BEFORE THE GAME

“Yeah, I thought so. I do think that Sacramento had more energy, particularly in the first half. They had 18 second chance points in the first half and we did not have any. So, I think we tried but I think Sacramento had a little bit more energy than we did.”

ON DAMIAN LILLARD’S DEMEANOR TONIGHT AND BEING SO DETERMINED

“I mean, Dames’ Dame. I think he knew he had a good rhythm, you see a couple go in and he was very efficient. I think the way he was shooting it, he knew he had a good feel tonight.”

ON MAURICE HARKLESS ENTERING THE EQUATION AND MOVING FORWARD

“He’s been good at both ends. Moving forward, I’m sure he will be playing. Evan [Turner] with minutes restriction, kind of makes it a little bit easier for me, but now, if I assume Evan’s minutes will be going up so they will have to come from somewhere.”

ON CLOSING THE GAME OUT TONIGHT

“Yeah, we did close the game out tonight. I like the fact that we got up 20 something and it got down to 13 and it got a little dicey there. We made some plays that we were able to keep them at bay.”

ON PUTTING CJ MCCOLLUM AND JUSUF NURKIC IN THE FOURTH QUARTER

“Dame had played his shift, and it was time for CJ to get back in there. To be honest, I like the fact that Dame had scored his 50 under 30 minutes. It’s only been done three times and we’ve got two of them, which is kind of impressive.”

 

PORTLAND TRAIL BLAZERS GUARD DAMIAN LILLARD:

ON IF THIS WAS THE EASIEST 50-POINT GAME HE’S HAD

“I don’t think any 50 [point game] is easy. I think it was similar to my other 50-point games just I didn’t play in the fourth quarter. Typically in my career when I come off a bad shooting night the way I shot last night, I shoot the ball better. Tonight, I think it was that mixed with a certain level of aggressiveness and urgency with us needing to win this game. I just felt good. They went under a bunch of pick-and-rolls in the first quarter and I was able to get some clean looks and see the ball go in. I think for any shooter, they feel like if they see some clean looks and see the ball go in then the tough ones start to go in. Then the bigs start to come up higher to the perimeter and that takes away the rim protection and I think that was pretty much how it happened.”


ON HIS MINDSET SEEMING A LITTLE MORE DETERMINED TONIGHT

“I mean, I’m always determined and I’m always locked in. I take the game really seriously all the time. I think tonight, like I said, after a big win for us last night at home, coming on the road and a back-to-back – we come and we always have let downs in Sacramento. They play really hard, they compete. When you come to somebody else’s floor and let them get confidence and they’re already a tough, grind it out, competitive team whether wins or losses is a setup for a let down. My mentality was just come in and be aggressive, force the issue and just try to impose my will in as many ways as possible, and just make sure we come out on top tonight because I just had a certain feeling about this game that we just had to have it.”

ON BEING ABLE TO CLOSE OUT TONIGHT

“Yeah, it’s the NBA – it’s a game of runs, guys are talented and guys are competitive. So you’re going to have nights like last night where the lead, team’s shrink that gap and they make a push and that’s what happened last night. What’s most important though is finishing it and being able to weather those storms and I thought we did a good job of that last night. Then you have tonight’s like tonight where you’re just a little bit sharper – I think we had like a 22-point lead or something like that and then it went down to like 13 and then we managed it from there. [The Kings] started hitting 3s, sometimes that’s going to happen, but I thought we kept them at a pretty good distance and managed the game pretty well to put them away.”

ON IF 50 POINTS IN LESS THAN 30 MINUTES IS COOL TO HIM

“I saw we were up 20 and I was like, ‘Okay, if we keep this lead, there’s really no reason to go back in there.’ I’d rather have 50 in 29 minutes with some character than go out there and chase 60 – I feel like that’s bad karma – I feel like I have plenty opportunities to do that. But, [Coach Stotts] told me ‘If this lead gets to about 13, you’re going to go back in the game,’ and as soon as he said it they hit a 3 to cut it to 13, and he was all like, ‘Alright.’ I went to the scorer’s table and then we answered it right back – [Shabazz Napier] hit a three. Then we got a stop and got fouled and by the time there was a stoppage there was no point in going in the game so we looked at each other and we both agreed that is was probably best to not go in.”

ON IF HE HAD 50 POINTS SCORED ON HIM EARLY IN HIS CAREER

“I think my third year in the league, Kyrie [Irving] had 50 on us in Cleveland and I took it personal even though I wasn’t guarding him for the majority of the game – I took it personal. But, I think it’s just something about being young – as a young player in this league people got on me about my defense all the time. I think it takes time to learn the terms, to learn coverages and player tendencies. It’s experience in this league that allows you to become a better defender so really it’s not on the guy or his fault when he’s young – there’s a lot of ways you can be manipulated as a young player and that’s what happened to me at times. De’Aaron [Fox] competes hard – he’s competitive. A bunch of guys guarded me, it wasn’t just all on one person. That’s also something about this league, any time you’re playing against a guy that gets hot or is an elite scorer, it takes a group defense to slow guys down – it’s hardly ever one guy.”

 

That Joerger quote is freaking fantastic. hahahaa. He moved up a notch in my book.