The Blazers fire again in the final quarter

THE Blazers are still the only ones to break down Thunder this season – November 5 – and they weren’t far from making it a double hit. They entered the “time of money”, trailing by eight points the current champion.

“We knew we had to fight and make a total collective effort”, Chris Murray explained. “We did that for 42 of the 48 minutes of the game. That’s part of the story of our season.”

It is six minutes of the first six of the last quarter, where the Thunder will play 17-6. Portland had a two-point lead after three quarters and in a few moments everything fell apart. Danny Avdija and his teammates will find the resources to get back to two units, less than three minutes from the end. But Shai Gilgeous-Alexander is too strong and the Blazers lose.

It’s obviously frustrating, but when we know that the Thunder have been crushing everything since the beginning of the season, a loss like this is “almost” a win…

“We’re in these games, we’ve won a few. We’ve made the reigning champion fight.”

“I hate to call it a moral victory, but we fought. I’m proud of the way we fought. We had a chance to win this match.”underscores Tiago Splitter. “It’s a big team, complicated to play with. We tried everything: we played small, played big, zone defense, caught two. But basically, you have to shoot and they could shoot more than us.”

As Chris Murray lamented, this isn’t the first time Portland has conceded in the final quarter. In “catch time” situations, i.e. five points or less in the last five minutes, Tiago Splitter’s men have a record of 5 wins and 7 losses.

Numerous injuries obviously aren’t helping and Oregon’s troops can only imagine and hope they evolve with their entire group, which could help reverse this trend.

“We’re missing a lot of managers and it’s noticeable,” assures Danny Avdija, the author of a huge triple-double (31 points, 19 rebounds, 10 assists). “But I’m so proud of the guys, who filled the holes. We’re in these games, we won a few of them. We made the defending champions fight. That’s something. We’re missing important players and I hope they come back soon. I can’t complain though and I can say I’m proud.”