-With Brandon Roy and Greg Oden injured, the core of the Blazers is Andre Miller, Marcus Camby and LaMarcus Aldridge. Aldridge has done nothing tonight, because he’s been in foul trouble, but Camby and Miller have combined for 26 of Portland’s 43 points. Nice job by Portland’s young guys, or not.
Blazers Make A Push To Take A Two-Point Lead, Thanks To A Missed Dunk
-Jeff Green shuffled his feet very blatantly on a pump fake. It’s the second time he’s done it tonight. For all the talk about Green being the prototypical role player, he does a lot of dumb things on the court, whether it’s bad shots or obvious traveling violations. On the flip side, he plays great individual defense and has great on-court chemistry with Durant, so ... yeah, he’s interesting, like so many of OKC’s players.
-Portland zips ahead with eight straight points, the final two of which came after Nicolas Batum cut off the passing angle to Kevin Durant, stole the pass, tipped it to a teammate, then took a fullcourt pass and jammed it. Mike Rice says he can’t believe Portland got back into the game. Mike Prada says he loves Nicolas Batum.
-Leon Wood calls a foul on Batum guarding Durant. Mike Rice jokes that referee Leon Wood is the answer to OKC’s offensive woes in the third quarter.
-Andre Miller just hit a sweeping hook, prompting Rice to call Miller a “young [Kareem Abdul] Jabaar.” Andre Miller is 34 years old. He’s a young senior citizen, not a young Jabaar.
-Oklahoma City can run some really stagnant offensive sets, but none of that really matters if you have a guy like Russell Westbrook who can get into the lane at will. Rajon Rondo gets a lot of attention for being able to succeed without a jumper, but Westbrook largely gets overshadowed by Durant. This needs to change.
-Rudy Fernandez hits a three, and gets caught up in celebrating so much on the way back that Batum has to literally shove him toward his man on defense.
-Westbrook gets away from everyone in transition and ... BLOWS THE DUNK. “Boy, there’s some mustard on that UCLA dunk,” Rice exclaims. At the other end, Camby gets a three-point play, the Blazers lead by three and the crowd goes wild. Rice openly cheers. Oh jeez.
That’s the picture of agony if you’re a Thunder fan.
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