Portland shellacked
The Headline: LaMarcus Aldridge comes alive, but a dominating Celtics defense holds Portland to 34 percent shooting in this ugly loss
Portland Trail Blazers vs. Boston Celtics
When: 7:30 ET, Friday, November 30, 2012
Where: TD Garden (Boston)
Officials: Bennett Salvatore, Leroy Richardson, Pat Fraher
Attendance: 18,624
Love ‘em
L-Train has a good game
LaMarcus Aldridge did everything he could to keep Portland in this game. Unfortunately, he’s only one man.
L.A. scored 23 points on 8-16 shooting. Defensively he had eight rebounds, a steal and a block. He did a good job limiting the damage of Kevin Garnett while protecting the paint.
While the starters have played inconsistent basketball during the roadtrip, Aldridge remains solid. In his three games he’s averaging 24 points and 8.33 rebounds per game.
L.A. didn’t look soft tonight. (Photo: Michael Dwyer / AP)
Bench holds it’s own
The Blazers already look like they’re playing for next season with Terry Stotts giving significant minutes to his younger bench players over the veterans.
But that’s not necessarily a bad thing at this point, and the rookies are already showing improvement.
Meyers Leonard played 22 minutes. He responded with a solid line of 11 points, five rebounds, two steals and a block. He showed some scoring prowess, garnering six free throws and hitting five.
Will Barton didn’t have his best offensive game, but he contributed in plenty of other ways. He finished with three points, three rebounds, four assists and two steals in 17 minutes.
Hate ‘em
Three starters in single digits
Boston came in with a game plan: give them the paint, guard the perimeter, make Portland beat us with their shooting. They executed that plan perfectly.
Nicolas Batum, Damian Lillard and Wesley Matthews were all held to under 10 points in this game.
The Blazer’s three sharpshooters were held to 22 points on 24 percent shooting. Those three weren’t very effective on defense either, as Boston shot almost 50 percent on the night.
34 percent shooting
Once again, Portland’s shooting has started to slip.
The Blazers shot 34 percent in this game, and were 3-15 on threes. Portland couldn’t even land their free throws, shooting 73 percent from the line.
While most of this is a product of Boston’s defense, no doubt the long road trip is taking it’s toll.
Fast break giveaways
On top of everything else, Portland was beat by their own run-’n-gun game.
Boston had 16 total steals on the night, and forced 23 Blazer turnovers. The Celtics managed to turn that into 20 fastbreak points.
About Jonathan Irwin
