Trail Blazers down 0-2, but home court is still important
Throughout the 2014-15 regular season, NBA teams all across the country won just 58 percent of their home games—the lowest winning percentage in recent memory. Golden State (95.1%) and Atlanta (85.4%) were the only two teams this season to record home win percentages that placed them among the top 30 since 2004. This season was good to these two teams. The Warriors in particular had an all-time-great regular season, winning 67 games. But outside of these two outliers, the NBA had a home court problem. Analysts declared home-court advantage a relic, an edge upon which NBA teams could no longer rely.
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If the 2014-15 regular marked the death of home court advantage, its resurrection certainly did not take long. Entering Saturday’s slate of games, home teams have gone 15-7—including two really bad performances by likely sweep victim Toronto. Last season, home teams won just 55% of home games in the first round of the playoffs. The year before last, that number was 63.4%.
Admittedly, it is still early. But through these first 22 games, home court has been invaluable these playoffs. Home teams are +4 in free throw attempts per game in the playoffs, while that advantage was just +0.8 in the regular season. Home teams have committed 1.3 fewer fouls per game than their opponents, nearly double the regular season discrepancy. Teams’ true shooting percentage is 3% better at home, and a comparison of team’s shot charts shows a clear advantage for the home team, something we did not see in the regular season.
Now, what does all this mean for the Trail Blazers? Well, it is Portland’s turn to play at home. The Moda Center will be loud, energetic, and the Trail Blazers have an expanding roster that now features an active Arron Afflalo and Chris Kaman— something Portland did not have in Memphis.
Portland finished the regular season with the fourth best home record, winning 78% of their home games. Memphis finished sixth. Hopefully for Portland, playing in front of a raucous home crowd will light some sort of fire that didn’t travel with the team to Memphis last weekend.
The long established narrative of role players playing better at home seems to be playing out in these playoffs as well, and the narrative has permeated this series more so than many others as the Grizzlies bench has registered a true shooting percentage of 53.2% and a plus/minus of +17.1, well above their season averages and slightly better than their averages against Portland in two home games during the regular season. Considering shooting in this series has been so abysmal—Portland is shooting -9.8% and Memphis -1.5% over their regular season true shooting percentages—Those numbers are made all the more striking.
This has also been a phenomenally physical series, probably the most physical two games of the playoffs thus far. And for as physical as it has been, this series has seen the lowest foul rate of the playoffs to this point. Both teams are fouling at a rate of just once every five possessions.
As difficult a matchup as the Grizzlies might be for Damian Lillard, its unreasonable to expect him to continue shooting just 27% from the floor, or the lousy 9.1% he shot from behind the arc in the first two games. If Portland expects to hold serve at home in this series, they will need much better production from not just Lillard, but the rest of the team as well. Adjustments will be made, the good guys will play better at home, and the bad guys will play worse on the road, that’s the most Popovichian analysis of how the NBA playoffs work. There should be some tough basketball played in Portland tonight.
If the trend of these playoffs continues, expect the numbers to swing back in favor of Portland at home. With an 0-3 deficit, a virtual death sentence in a seven game series, knocking on Portland’s door, expect a backs-against-the-wall type performance out of the Trail Blazers tonight. Anything less will not be enough against this Grizzlies team.