Exclusive PLAYOFFS: ROUND 1, GAME 5: THUNDER @ BLAZERS - APRIL 23, 2019 - Quote Book

Postgame Notes - April 23, 2019
(3) Portland 118, (6) Oklahoma City 115
2019 NBA Playoffs • First Round, Game No. 5

TEAM
• The Trail Blazers won their first round series against the Thunder, 4-1. Portland advances to the NBA
Western Conference Semifinals for the 12th time in franchise history and the first time since 2016.
• Portland won a best-of-seven series in five games for the third time in franchise history.
• The Trail Blazers became the third team in NBA history to defeat an opponent in a best-of-seven play-
off series after being swept, 4-0, by the opponent in the regular season series.
• The Trail Blazers trailed the Thunder, 107-92, with 7:12 remaining in the fourth quarter before closing
the game on a 26-8 run.
• Portland outrebounded Oklahoma City, 45-39, and outscored the Thunder in the paint, 54-48.
• The Trail Blazers had 13 offensive rebounds leading to 19 second chance points, while the Thunder
had six offensive rebounds leading to 12 second chance points.

PLAYER

• Damian Lillard scored a postseason franchise-record 50 points (17-33 FG, 10-18 3-PT, 6-8 FT), in-
cluding a series-winning three-pointer from 37 feet as time expired, to go with seven rebounds, six as-
sists, three steals and one block. He is the first player in NBA history to score 50-plus points and make
a game-winning buzzer-beater in the same playoff game. His 10 three-pointers mark the second-most
three-pointers in a playoff game in NBA history (11, Klay Thompson, 5/28/16 - GSW at OKC).
• Damian Lillard’s 34 points in the first half tied his own record for most points in a half in franchise
history – regular season or playoffs (34, 10/25/18 at Orl.). It was the most points by an NBA player in a
playoff half since Steve Nash scored 35 at Dallas on May 15, 2005.
• With his sixth three-pointer, Damian Lillard (118 three-pointers) moved into first place on the all-
time franchise list for three-pointers in the playoffs (Porter, 113). His six three-pointers in the first half
matched the franchise record for three-pointers in a half in a playoff game (six, McCollum – 4/29/15 at
Mem.).
• For the series, Damian Lillard averaged 33.0 points (46.1% FG, 48.1% 3-PT, 84.6% FT), 4.4 re-
bounds, 6.0 assists and 2.40 steals. His 33.0 points per game mark the highest scoring average for a
playoff series in franchise history.
• CJ McCollum scored 17 points (8-19 FG, 1-7 3-PT) to go with two rebounds, two assists and two
blocks. He scored 10 of his points in the fourth quarter on 5-of-8 shooting. With his eighth point, McCol-
lum (627 points) passed Arvydas Sabonis (617) for 10th on the franchise playoff scoring list.
• Maurice Harkless finished with 17 points (6-9 FG, 5-10 FT), seven rebounds, one assist and one
steal. He scored 10 points (3-3 FG, 4-4 FT) in the final period to go with four rebounds.
• Al-Farouq Aminu finished with nine points (3-7 FG, 1-2 3-PT, 2-2 FT), five rebounds and three as-
sists.
• Seth Curry recorded seven points (3-8 FG, 1-4 3-PT), three rebounds, one assist and two steals.
• Enes Kanter logged a double-double of 13 points (6-9 FG, 1-1 FT) to go with 13 rebounds, four as-
sists and one block. It was his second double-double of the series.
• Paul George had a team-high 36 points (14-20 FG, 3-8 3-PT, 5-8 FT) to go with seven rebounds, one
assist and one steal.
• Russell Westbrook recorded a triple-double of 29 points (11-31 FG, 4-11 3-PT, 3-3 FT), 11 rebounds
and 14 assists to go with four steals and two blocks. It was the 10th triple-double of his postseason
career.

 

HEAD COACH TERRY STOTTS

“The legend grows.”


You don’t like to rank games, but where does this rank among the great games you’ve seen?

“Damian’s performance was probably the best performance I’ve seen in person. Off the top of my head, I can’t think of – I’ve seen 50 point games obviously, but the way he carried the team in the first half with CJ in foul trouble, the magnitude of the last shot, obviously to win a series – the fact that he’s now won two series on a single shot, or on two shots I should say. It was quite a performance. We had a lot of good effort up and down. You don’t win a game with one guy, but he certainly was special tonight.”


What is Kanter going through and what can you say about his toughness tonight?

“I tell you what, he gave it all. His shoulder is bothering him, he played through pain. Even with the pain, he was posting up. We played through him a little bit in the fourth quarter. He got some big rebounds but the toughness he showed – I think it’s a little indicative of our team, the fact that everybody does whatever they can to get a win.”


When did Nurkic show up and what kind of an effect did you see that have?

“I was told that we were down 8 when he showed, up so he’s got a plus-8, actually more than that. We won by three right? So plus-11, so his plus-minus was really good. That, obviously, you guys know it, you felt it in the building when they showed him on the big screen, the fact that he showed up – no one knew that he was going to show up. I honestly, I think he fed off of that. There was a little good karma when he did show up.”


You see the clock running out and it becomes apparent Lillard is going to shoot from near half court, what were you thinking?

“Honestly, I mean, I didn’t mind it because it was a tie score. Paul George and Westbrook both had five fouls. We had momentum. So if it did go to overtime, I liked our chances with all that going on. But, when it got down to four or five, I kind of knew what was going to happen.”


Can you talk about Lillard getting a lot more national attention now, but how many players have you seen that you’d be okay pulling up with a 37-footer to win a game?

“You know, he’s special. He’s in a class of his own. It’s funny, if Steph Curry does that, people don’t think much of it, but Dame, for people who have not seen us play much, Dame’s had a special year. He is in the category of all those guys that he probably doesn’t get as much acknowledgement for, but he has been doing it. People in Portland know he’s been doing it, he carried our team this year, so that’s who he is and I’m thankful for it.”


What went into your decision to play Lillard the whole first half and how did you see him respond?

“It really was an easy decision with CJ with 3 fouls, I knew I wasn’t going to go back with CJ. He was having a night and for the first half, he can play 24 minutes. I didn’t know how the second half was going to go but it made no sense to take him out in the first half.”

 

DAMIAN LILLARD

Describe the feeling when the ball went through on the game winner:

“It was a great feeling. When it left my hands, it felt good. I felt good about it. The last five or six minutes of the game, I just keep telling myself, like, for us to get this game, we was going to have to really, really dig to come out on top. The fact that I kept telling myself that and then we came out on top when the shot went in, I was like, man it really happened. We really dug and pulled it out. So it was a great feeling.”


Everybody in the building had flashbacks to the game winner vs. Houston; how different or similar was that shot to the one tonight?

“It was a little bit different. In that game we were down by two, there was less time. That time, I actually broke the play. Not a lot of people know that I just broke the play. All the guys out there were telling me just run to the ball and that’s what I did. Tonight, this was kind of the way it was set up. It was just set up.”


What impact do you think Nurkic’s appearance had?

“I would love to see what his plus-minus was tonight because I think we was down 10 when he came out there with 3 minutes left or something like that. I guess it was a huge impact. I think they put the camera on him and the crowd went crazy and I heard them. He gave us a nice punch.”


You have the ball the whole last possession, at what point do you decide to shoot from out there?

“I didn’t want to put it in the referee’s hands – where if there was contact and maybe they get away with contact or I end up having to take a tougher shot because there’s contact and they don’t want to decide the game. So I was standing there looking at the rim and I was like, this is a comfortable range. My trainer Phil Beckner, we was working out the other night in OKC and he was just like, ‘just take a few deep ones off the dribble, let’s shoot a few deep ones.’ He was like, ‘I’m telling you, you’re going to hit one of these.’ He kept saying, ‘you’re going to hit one of these.’ When I was standing there, I was like I’m going to shoot it. He was a little bit off of me and I was like this is enough space for me to just raise up and shoot it for game. At the last second, he stepped towards me a little bit and I was like, okay I’m going to pound-dribble, side-step and raise up. I just had to let it fly, shoot the ball high in the air to give it a chance and that’s what I did.”


Is it hard to find the energy to shoot a ball from that far with how many minutes you played?

“Not really. I think a lot of times, those situations are handled way before the time comes. In the summer, I think when you truly prepare yourself and put yourself through those types of things, the training, the conditioning, things like that – when you cheat yourself, you fail in those moments, you crash. When you really put the time in, whether people see it or whether people know it or not, it always come to like. I didn’t even know I was going to play that many minutes. The first half, coach just didn’t take me out then I played the whole third. It was just on the fly, he just decided to do it randomly and I was prepared for it because of the way I approach my stuff in the summer.”


Can you describe the emotion in the celebration – you had a moment with your brother among the chaos:

“Yeah, I mean my brother was sitting courtside and he don’t say nothing. My brother’s like me, we just kind of keep our composure. We put the work in. We really believe in what we do. We believe in ourselves. That was it coming out. It’s been a lot of back and forth, a lot of talk and all this stuff, and that was the last word. That was having the last word.”


After you hit the shot you waved to the OKC bench, can you describe that moment and the emotion?

“I mean, the series was over. That was it. I was just waving goodbye to them. I think after game three, Dennis Schroder was out there pointing to his wrist, they was out there doing all these celebrations and doing all this stuff and we kept our composure. After one win, that was what they decided to do and we was like, okay what we want to do is win four games. When we win those four games, there’s not going to be nothing to talk about, so that’s what that was.”


Would you say that’s the best game you’ve ever played, your best performance?

“I’ve played a lot of games. I think that’s probably the best – just because it was a close-out game. You don’t want to put yourself in position to have to go back to OKC, they believing they just stole one here and now it’s even more pressure on us in a game seven at home. We were down double figures under five minutes. It just, everything was looking like we was going back to OKC. So just to be able to come up big, not just me, but our team. To be able to come up big and to bite down and make all the plays defensively, come up with the rebounds. Seth had a huge defensive possession, coming up with a steal on a loose ball, Moe making free throws down the stretch, all of those things that we did to give ourselves a chance to win was huge. My part in it, I think was probably my most important performance.”


Could you describe the range of emotions in the last year from getting swept in the first round, injuries, and getting through the first round?

“My message has been the same from the moment that we got swept. I just kept saying when you go through stuff like that, in our locker room, we’ve got good people. We’ve got a great environment every day. We do things the right way and we work hard. We do everything to give ourselves the best chance. To go into the playoffs last year and have that type of experience, in my mind, I didn’t feel bad for myself. I was like, I’m going to accept responsibility that we didn’t play well. It was embarrassing but when you go through stuff like that and you stay together and you keep working, you keep believing in what we do – our purpose, what we come into training camp saying to each other, what our coaches are saying, the unity that we have. We stay true to that and keep believing in what we’ve built up here, it’s going to be something waiting for us. We don’t go through stuff when you’ve got a group of good guys that work hard and do things the right way, in my mind, I was just like something down the road is going to work out for us if we just stay with it and keep our minds right. I think this is the beginning of that.”


On Kanter playing hurt, how meaningful was that?

“It was huge. He had a lot of great defensive plays at the rim with verticality with guys coming downhill at him. He was impacting the ball. Guys going up, he was changing shots, coming up with extra possessions, tipping balls, finishing in the paint. He just did a lot of things, even after he got fouled and hurt his shoulder, he came down and hit free throws. It was just a grind it out game. I think from top to bottom, everybody that touched the floor tonight showed toughness. He was one of the main guys that did.”

 

C.J. McCOLLUM

On Damian Lillard’s performance tonight

“I think this performance definitely ranks towards the top, just because of what he had to go through tonight. I picked up my third foul in the first quarter and he had to play 24 straight minutes. He had to carry the load offensively while trying to guard Russ [Westbrook], who’s attacking downhill every possession. His confidence never wavered. He really hit tough shots off the dribble, finishing around the basket. He carried the load for us all night. When we needed baskets, he got them. I think we were down 15 in the fourth quarter. [Jusuf] Nurkic [got to the game] with about three or four minutes left, we were down eight, and I just looked at [Damian] and said, ‘Bro, we can still win this game.’ He said, ‘I know. We need one stop at a time.’ I said ‘Let me know when you need a break,’ and down the stretch for the last play I took it out of bounds, I was like, ‘You want the ball, right?’ and he was like, ‘Yeah.’”

On the feeling after winning tonight

“It’s been a roller coaster of emotions. I picked up my third foul in the first quarter on a questionable charge call and then I have to sit and watch. My rhythm was gone. You want to help the team, but trying not to be too aggressive, to figuring out ways to contribute, to being able to tie the game up, and then needing a stop. Seeing [Jusuf] Nurkic come… I knew Nurk didn’t want to leave his house, so seeing him come I knew we really had to get the win for the Big Fella. To win it in that type of fashion, down 15, just shows what we’ve gone through this season.”

 

ENES KANTER

On what it means to play with Damian Lillard

“We were just talking about it in the locker room, when he made that great shot against Houston [in 2014] … [we were talking about it] five days ago. I was in Turkey and watching with my dad and I was like, ‘Wow, this is very special. Then five years later, I’m here and I’m his teammate and I witnessed that. I’ve never seen anything like it before. I’ve played with amazing players, but Dame [Lillard] is definitely number one.”


On what it means to play in Portland

“I would like to appreciate the teams that didn’t pick me. I tried to sign with lots of teams and they weren’t interested…Two days ago, I was looking in the mirror and thought, ‘I should be blessed. I was blessed.’”


On his thoughts on Damian Lillard’s game-winning shot

“That’s why they call him Logo Lillard. Not just that shot, but the whole series, he did an amazing job. He kept his coolness and stayed calm. That’s what a great leader does. He made himself better and he made everyone better around him. When the shot left his hand, I was like, ‘You know what, that’s going in, because we all believe in him.’”

 

HEAD COACH BILLY DONOVAN

“Well obviously our guys came in and really, really competed…we did some different things for the game, and obviously both teams were forced to play small…I thought late in the game, I’m anxious to see some of them, but Russell’s [Westbrook] charge was a big play in the game, Ferguson’s over the back foul, that was another big play…we had a couple of fouls that put them at the free throw line…I don’t know if those calls were corrected or not…there were tough calls, and then Paul [George] had a couple of free throws he couldn’t knock down, so we kind of struggled just continuing to put points on the board and we gave them some free throws…[Moe] Harkless shot a lot at the free throw line, and then obviously [Damian] Lillard had a great game from start to finish. Our guys battled and competed, and we just wanted to close the game out.”

On focusing the defense near the basket and forcing Lillard to shoot outside:

“Honestly, for the whole first half I probably would have done the same thing with Paul, had he not picked up fouls…he made some tough shots, I mean you’ve got to give him credit…I think the night he had, the shots that he made epitomized the last shot of the game. Those are the kinds of shots he made throughout the first half. I thought some were really well-defended…I thought we worked hard, we tried to trap him some…sometimes he’d kind of get through it and get downhill…[C.J.] McCollum never really got into the flow of the game with the foul trouble, but I thought that last five minutes he kind of stepped up and made some big shots for them as well. Credit to McCollum’s elbow mid-range jumpers off the pull-up dribble, well-guarded, which obviously kind of got them on their run.”

On ending the season on a buzzer-beating play:

“It’s tough, because you’re sitting over there as a coach and your guys are really fighting…like I said, we had some things down that just didn’t really go wrong, and I don’t fault our guys at all, I just say that there were plays like a great play to Dennis [Schroder] in the corner and he just couldn’t knock down the shot, Terrance [Ferguson] I thought tipped the ball for a layup, we got called for a foul, a charge…Jerami [Grant] had one on the baseline but he just didn’t finish it…we kind of came up with some empty possessions, and we were doing some really, really good things, we just didn’t finish some plays to really just keep extending the lead, and then some of the fouling, and then obviously they were shot-making, that got them back in the game.”

On how the Thunder defense played:

“Yeah, I thought we moved the basketball, we really did some better things…I thought closing out the second half of game four, we were better offensively, I thought we had our moments where we were okay…I thought tonight from start to finish we played well offensively…both teams were small, there was a lot of switching, so it seemed like we were having to play isolation elbow drive basketball…but I thought our guys played a good job offensively. Defensively, I really felt like from the sideline that Lillard made some really, really hard shots. Early in the game, he had one where he was driving and he jumped off one leg…but I thought we really did some things that Jerami was able to do for us really well, which was good for us.”

 

RUSSELL WESTBROOK

On blowing a 12-point lead in the fourth quarter:

“I’m very disappointed.”

On what went wrong in the last four minutes:

“Not really sure.”

On the Thunder’s offense tonight:

“I thought we did a good job getting to the paint, making plays, finishing around the basket, getting the shots we wanted to…”

On his process for after tough losses like this:

“My process is always look at myself first, and then figure out what I could have done better throughout the whole season to put my team in position to be able to win games.”

 

PAUL GEORGE

On Damian Lillard’s game-winning shot and when he knew it would be a three-pointer:

“The second I started creeping up to him. Game-winning, with time winding down…it’s a tough shot.”

On his off-season plans for his injured shoulder:

“Yeah, we’ll approach it and address it this summer, coming back next season healthy. That’s the plan, get as healthy as possible going into next year.”

On being eliminated in the first round of the playoffs:

“It’s very disappointing. We let this one slip away…it is what it is.”

On Damian Lillard’s performance:

“He just made big shots. Tip my hat to the shots he made, tough ones. Contested, 35-plus-feet out, tough shots. It was his night, he felt it, and knocked them down.”

On defending deep shooters and allowing them to take those shots:

“Yeah, I mean that’s a bad shot…I don’t care what anybody says, that’s a bad shot. But he made it, that story will be told that it was a bad shot, and you live with that.”