Feb 13, 2013; New Orleans, LA, USA; New Orleans Hornets power forward Anthony Davis (23) guard Portland Trail Blazers point guard Damian Lillard (0) during the second quarter of a game at the New Orleans Arena. Mandatory Credit: Derick E. Hingle-USA TODAY Sports

The NBA is a strange place. One night a team can blow out the best team (record-wise) in the Western Conference on the road, and then two nights later that same team (the one who perpetrated said blowout) can find themselves going head-to-head with the worst team (record-wise) in the Western Conference. To make things even more strange, the team that gave the best team their worst loss of the season is the same team whose worst lose of this same season came the last time they faced that worst recording owning team.

Confused yet? Well, that’s the situation Portland finds themselves in Sunday evening in New Orleans. On Friday night the Blazers whipped the Spurs by 30; back on February 13th, on the eve of the All-Star Break, the Hornets thrashed Portland by 36. Using Portland as the B variable in the transitive property of equality equation (if a=b and b=c then a=c) The Hornets should be able to beat the Spurs by 66 points, even if San Antonio currently is  27 wins better than NOLA.

Like I said, the NBA is strange.

Nothing has been decided with regards to the Blazers post season future. Likely, Portland misses the playoffs by a game or two (or five). But beating San Antonio in San Antonio while getting almost half a C in the fourth quarter and playing just about the best up and down basketball of the season in the process can change some perspectives in a hurry. All isn’t lost if Portland follows up a big win in Texas with a loss in Louisiana, but a 1-2 road trip late in the season is still a 1-2 road trip, even if that one win came against the top team in the west.

Blazers Starting 5: PG Damian Lillard, SG Wesley Mathews, SF Nicolas Batum, PF LaMarcus Aldridge, C J.J. Hickson

Hornets Starting 5: PG Greivis Vaaquez, SG Eric Gordon, SF Al-Farouq Aminu, PF Antony Davis, C Robin Lopez

NOLA absolutely pasted the Blazers in Portland’s final game before taking vacation time for All-Star. LaMarcus Aldridge talked openly about being tired, which made sense considering he and his team were closing out a tough road trip that included very close losses to the Miami Heat, the Dallas Mavericks, and the Orlando Magic, a blowout loss to the Rockets in Houston, and basically the end of the playoff dream.

Sunday, the Blazers won’t have exhaustion as an excuse, just as they won’t be able to claim being already checked out for the break. In fact, it’s highly unlikely that Portland will have another chance this season to build on a win quite like the one they got on Friday. In short, the Blazers need to win on Sunday. Not because a 2-1 road trip puts them in the playoffs (it doesn’t), but because the Hornets are a long-term building project who will likely be in the lottery, or close to the lottery, for at least the next few seasons and Portland isn’t. At least, the Blazers don’t want to be. If Portland wants to keep their name out of the list of teams vying for the number one pick (the Sacramentos, Charlottes, Washingtons, Orlandos, and Phoenixs of the NBA) they have to beat bad teams.

The Hornets are a grind-it-out team. They’ll try to keep the score low, making Portland work in the half court and forcing the Blazers to earn every bucket. Portland hasn’t been able to impart their will on many opponents this season. The Blazers tend to match whatever type of game is being played against them. Friday, Portland played San Antonio’s game (getting up and down, taking a lot of shots, generally pushing the pace). It worked in part because the Spurs were without Tony Parker but mostly because the Blazers are a jump shooting team who on Friday shot 61% across the board (total field goals, two-point field goals, and three point field goals) and had an Effective Field Goal Percentage (an advanced stat that reflects the difference in value between twos and threes) of 69%. Sure the Spurs were short their best play maker, but Portland beat the best team in the West because they made shots.

If the Blazers shoot in NOLA like they did in San Antonio, the Hornets don’t have a chance. It’s unlikely Portland’s hot shooting will cross state lines with the team, but if the Blazers can turn Sunday’s contest into an up and down affair, avoiding the grinding half court game the Hornets will want to play, they should be OK.

What to Watch For

• Can the Blazers start hot. Portland scored 46 points in their last 12 minutes of game time. The odds they do the same again in their next 12 minutes of play are long. Forty-six shouldn’t be the number the Blazers shoot for, but it’s out there. This team can score, as they proved by hanging 136 on San Antonio. If they can start Sunday’s game with scoring, they’ll be able to set the tone for the entire night. The Hornets are not a high-scoring team, but they do have guys like Eric Gordan, Ryan Anderson, and Anthony Davis who may not be huge scorers but can put points on the board. I don’t think the team that wins the first quarter wins the game on Sunday (San Antonio led by two after 12 minutes on Friday), but if the Blazers can score in the high 20s or even into the 30s, Portland will give themselves a huge leg up.
• Defense and rebounding. In all likelihood, Sunday’s game will be decided based on which team plays better defense. That better defense will also include finishing defensive possessions with rebounds. Scoring is going to be at a premium on Sunday. If Portland can keep NOLA from scoring and off the offensive glass, they’ll be in good shape.
• Damian Lillard versus Anthony Davis. That Dame and the Brow won’t face off one-on-one has little relevance. Lillard and Davis are the cream of their draft class. They’re the two guys everybody is going to watch for years to come. Damian has separated himself from the rest of the pack (winning all four Western Conference Rookie of the Month Awards and doing a lot of things that haven’t ever really been done before by a first-year NBA player), and that has led to a bit of a mixed bag media-wise. There are some who claim that maybe he isn’t as great as his relative greatness would suggest. There are others who disagree. What’s almost without debate, though, is how good Anthony Davis is/is going to be. I haven’t seen much of Davis this season, but it makes sense that national writers would lavish praise all over the number one overall pick. Davis comes from the University of Kentucky having won a National Championship, so he has the amateur bona fides Damian lacks (Lillard never played in the NCAA Tournament at Weber State). Davis also has basically unlimited potential considering that he’s 19, still learning the game of basketball, and still growing into his body. There’s almost no possible way Damian has hit his ceiling in his first season, but it’s not hard to see that Lillard growth potential isn’t quite that of Davis. That being said, claiming that Damian isn’t that good or that his record breaking season hasn’t been phenomenal, smacks a bit of trolling and is certainly not a sentiment I agree with.

@mikeacker | @ripcityproject | mike.acker1@gmail.com

Feb 13, 2013; New Orleans, LA, USA; New Orleans Hornets power forward Anthony Davis (23) guard Portland Trail Blazers point guard Damian Lillard (0) during the second quarter of a game at the New Orleans Arena. Mandatory Credit: Derick E. Hingle-USA TODAY Sports

The Portland Trail Blazers left early for the All-Star Break. In their place, Wednesday night, was a team of guys who looked exactly like the Blazers we’ve come to know and love over 53 games minus any and all basketball talent.

LaMarcus Aldridge called this six-game swing a make or break trip. His team finishes said trip with one win while losing the last five. They nearly set every record for futility in history against the worst team they’ve played in two weeks. And they’re no longer “in the conversation.”

We’ve got some time off now. Damian Lillard and LaMarcus Aldridge get to showcase the best of what Portland has to offer during All-Star Weekend (you know to remind the world that all is not even close to lost in the Pacific Northwest), and when we reconvene in about a week, we can talk about how best to proceed to maximize what’s left of the season.

I’ll go on record as saying I’m an advocate of Portland continuing to try to win games. If their play in Miami shows anything, it’s that getting up for the big games isn’t something this team has to work on. There are big games left to play in 2012-13. There are plenty of chances to try to excite the fan base for the next season or two. Figuring out how to manufacture wins will be an important next step. But that’s something for another day.

Since I don’t have the energy to talk about Wednesday’s monstrosity, here’s a collection of Tweets that basically sum ups how things are going at this moment in Blazer-land:

Nothing makes me happier than the Blazers losing by 36 points to the lowly Hornets.

— Kyle Vondrachek (@vonderdick) February 14, 2013

 

The Blazers pretty much embarassed the entire Pacific Nortwest tonight #Sad #ReallySad

— Douchebag Dewey (@SoyMuyGuapo32) February 14, 2013

 

Thanks to Portland’s 5 game losing streak Lakers now tied w/ Blazers for the 9th spot. #LetsGoLakers

— Pong Ducanes (@ompongski) February 14, 2013

 

This is your daily reminder that the Blazers have a better record than the… oh shoot… tied with the Lakers now

— Pinwheel Empire (@pinwheelempire) February 14, 2013

 

Meyers Leonard dunk with 2:04 assures Blazers won’t set franchise record for fewest points. Portland trails New Orleans 96-59

— Jason Quick (@jwquick) February 14, 2013

 

Gonna go stand outside of Powell’s with a clipboard and ask people to donate some money to the Blazers.

— Ian Karmel (@IanKarmel) February 14, 2013

 

Nets scored 39 points in 2nd quarter tonight vs Nuggets. Blazers have 38 points in the game with 4:41 left in the 3rd quarter

— ESPN Stats & Info (@ESPNStatsInfo) February 14, 2013

 

Blazers embarrassing the rest of the Big 10 right now.

— Ian Karmel (@IanKarmel) February 14, 2013

 

46-point first quarter for the Clippers. The Blazers scored 63 points in four quarters today.

— Stephen Coston (@NBA247OFFICIAL) February 14, 2013

Enjoy the All-Star Break everybody. All I ask is that you remember two things, this season isn’t about wins and loses (not really), and one game, be it either positive or negative, doesn’t literally make or break a season.

Box Score (if you can stand it)

Standings

@mikeacker | @ripcityproject | mike.acker1@gmail.com

Feb 13, 2013; New Orleans, LA, USA; Portland Trail Blazers head coach Terry Stotts against the New Orleans Hornets during the second quarter of a game at the New Orleans Arena. Mandatory Credit: Derick E. Hingle-USA TODAY Sports

Feb 11, 2013; Auburn Hills, MI, USA; New Orleans Hornets power forward Anthony Davis (left) listens to New Orleans Hornets head coach Monty Williams (right) during the first quarter against the Detroit Pistons at The Palace. Mandatory Credit: Tim Fuller-USA TODAY Sports

Wednesday is Portland’s final game before the All-Star Break, and it really can’t come too soon. The Blazers haven’t been bad thus far in 2012-13, not as bad as a lot of people projected that they’d be, but it’s been up and down the whole way and stressful enough that I for one could use a couple of days off.

My only worry is that this team will be checking out a day early, and this “make or break” road trip will end 1-5 and it might finally be time to talk about the best way to wind the season down so as to avoid that anti sweet-spot where Portland misses the Playoffs and punt their first round pick.

Depending on how you feel about the Blazers, seeing the New Orleans Hornets Pelicans Hornets is either the best or the worst thing that could happen to this team one day before they get their only extended break of the season. A loss puts the Blazers closer to keeping their pick; a win might get Portland back on track for the Playoffs.

That NOLA is one of the bottom dwellers of the Western Conference adds an extra wrinkle. The Blazers played one of their best games of the season in a loss to Miami on Tuesday night and one of their worst in a loss to Orlando on Sunday. The Hornets are closer to the Magic than they are to the Heat. Portland has shown they play to the level of their competition.

Wednesday’s competition is not great. That could go a long way to determining the outcome of the final game of this trip, and that outcome (considering what implications it might carry over to the final run of 2012-13) could go a long way to determine the relative stress levels of Blazer fans everywhere.

Blazers Starting 5: PG Damian Lillard, SG Wesley Matthews, SF Nicolas Batum, PF LaMarcus Aldridge, C J.J. Hickson

Hornets Starting 5: PG Greivis Vasquez, SG Austin Rivers, SF Al-Farouq Aminu, PF Anthony Davis, C Robin Lopez

The first time these two teams met, Portland took a big lead early but let NOLA make it interesting down the stretch. Not really a recipe for success, but it led to this:

Damian Lillard’s first game winner came in his second full month as a pro and in his 23rd game. That seemed late considering he’d been magnificent in every game up to that point without hitting a game winning bucket. To say our expectations for Damian are high is an understatement. To say that he hasn’t exceeded even those high expectations in patently false.

So here we are almost two months removed from Lillard’s game winner, and he’s still improving every time out. His nominal competition from Rookie of the Year includes NOLA’s Anthony Davis. That’s probably enough to get Damian fired up for Wednesday (whether or not he claims to care about competing with Davis). Even more of a motivator for Wednesday is the fact that his team seriously needs a win. My contention is, tonight, as Damian goes, so will go the Blazers.

What to Watch For

• Wesley Matthews and Nicolas Batum. New Orleans is probably weakest at shooting guard and small forward (depending on whether or not Eric Gordon plays significant minutes). Wesley should not struggle on either end with Austin Rivers. Same goes for Nicolas an Al-Farouq Aminu. Both Batum and Matthews should be able to go off. If they do, the Blazers should win.
• Can Portland tighten up the screws. The Blazers have played a bit loose in the last few weeks. Their defense isn’t great, and they tend to make a lot more mistakes than they really should. NOLA is not a great team, so if Portland plays tight defense, doesn’t turn the ball over, and doesn’t give up too many offensive rebounds/second-chance points, they should be alright. Conversely, if the Hornets feast on the Blazers’ mistakes, Portland will be in trouble.
• Ryan Anderson. Dude can bomb. The Blazers can’t defend shooters. Not a great combination.

@mikeacker | @ripcityproject | mike.acker1@gmail.com