Both of the Blazers young stars showed up in a major way tonight, having breakout nights on the biggest stage and leading the Blazers to a huge victory. The first playoff victory in the Rose Garden since a 2003 must-win against Dallas. LaMarcus Aldridge deserves a ton of credit (and he’ll get his later)…but there is no way these re-thoughts get started without talking about  Brandon Roy. What was that Kanye? Bow in the presence of greatness. What more can you say about Brandon Roy? It’s sad his performance got stuck on NBA TV, I feel like it could have used one of those Charles Barkley ‘he is ballin’ type endorsements. I also feel like a lot of people missed out on something, but then again they’ve been missing out on Roy’s game all year. One of the bigger question marks surrounding this Blazer team coming into the post-season was whether Brandon Roy would be able to follow in the footsteps of CP3 and Deron Williams and bring his game to the big stage. Some people pointed to the fact that he would be guarded by Shane Battier and Ron Artest and tossed around the words “shut-down” and “slow down”. To anyone who had any of those questions or doubts… Tonight was your answer. Roy officially took his game to another level in Game 2 with a phenomenal 42-point effort. That effort tied Clyde Drexler’s 42-point performance in the 1992 NBA Playoffs for the second most in Blazer history. Anytime you get your name up there with that man you’re doing something right. And in this, a must-win situation, the performance could not have come at a bigger time and on a bigger stage.  The series is even mainly thanks to Roy. His quarters read 10, 9, 11 and 12. He adjusted from Game 1. There were 12 free throw attempts tonight compared to 1 on Saturday night. But he also realized the type of buckets he would have to score. He went toe-to-toe with Artest and Battier and said ‘I’m winning this battle tonight’. Cross-overs left Battier helpless. Jumpers in Artest eyes.  Finishing through Yao. In simple terms, he went off.

Right by his side was LaMarcus Aldridge. Everyone and their mom knew he put up a stinker in Game 1. Tonight he responded in a huge way. We are talking J-Lo’s booty back in the day type huge. 27 points, 12 rebounds on 11-for-19 shooting. Nice enough. Even nicer when you consider that without Aldridge’s 12 point second quarter, the Blazers more than likely don’t win this game. He deserves just as much credit for Portland’s win as anyone else. He dropped nearly half of Portland’s points that quarter (25) and helped the Blazers stem an unreal push from Houston’s bench. Take that away and….yeah. Like Roy, he also made adjustments from Game 1 to Game 2. Not only an increase in free throw attempts as well (8 compared to 2) but he took what the defense gave him. He didn’t force it and his shot selection was much better. He found ways to get into the paint and nailed big jumpers. He played like he had something to prove and did exactly just that.

The third player I want to get to before I talk about the game. Ron Artest. Portland survived a few things tonight. The main event they survived was Ron Artest’s unreal performance in the first quarter. If you missed it, as Coup said in the Live!-Thoughts….he went B-A-N-A-N-A-S like Gwen Stefani. 13 points on 6-for-8 shooting…it was tough to watch on multiple levels. Everything was contested and the Blazers were playing well but because of Artest’s play they had nothing to show for it. It was also like deja vu with a Rocket superstar playing out of their mind to push them to the lead. On the other hand, said superstar was Ron Artest. The minute he started shooting fadeaways I smiled and knew the Blazers would be ok as long as they could whether the storm and keep it close. Why? Because Ron Artest is certifiably nuts. I knew if it got tight and he felt like he had it turned ‘on’ he was going to take some questionable shots and make some questionable decisions. More importantly he wasn’t going to think about looking at Yao Ming. Sure enough, in that first quarter he looked to score everytime he had the ball. Like Coup said he started dribbling forever, looking like Corey Maggette in a blowout. He wasn’t looking to pass unless he absolutely had to. No surprise that he went 1-for-12 the rest of the game. Also no surprise that Yao Ming finished with 6 field goal attempts. Credit an improved effort from the Blazers D but if you have 5 reasons why Yao only got up 6 shots, 3 of them are Ron Artest. Also no surprise that as Von Wafer was slicing and dicing the Blazer D in the fourth quarter I was begging for Adelman to put Ron-Ron back in to disrupt the offensive flow. Sure enough he did and the Blazers went on their game-winning run.

Now that I’ve gotten all of  that out of the way….what a game this was. And I’m not just saying that because the Blazers won, more because it was truly a great game to watch. Pick a cliche analogy: chess match, 15-round heavyweight boxing match, UFC fight, steel cage match, drinking contest or slobberknocker. They all applied to this game. To me it just felt like a big game of tug-of-war. Everyone makes fun of commentators who call the game a “game of runs”…well tonight proved those guys right. It just never felt like either team fully ever had momentum. Ever. I mean all night it was run after run after run. Both teams had an answer for each other all night, right down to the wire. Everytime the Rose Garden exploded and you felt like the Blazers were going to pull away, Houston was right there to answer. And everytime it looked as if Houston was starting to pull away and the crowd was anxious, Portland answered right back. Playoff basketball at its finest if you ask me. My best example of what I’m trying to say is this:  Houston’s largest lead was 7 was 7:41 left in the third and Portland erased that with a 16-6 run over the next 6 minutes. Portland was up 72-65 with a little over a minute left in the third. The game was tied 72-72 at the end of the quarter. It was just a night like that.

One of the biggest keys to winning in the playoffs is the ability to make adjustments and take things away from your opponent. And luckily when you take a butt-kicking like the one the Blazers received on Saturday…you have a lot of things you can adjust. Portland made clear adjustments on both ends. Offensively, there was a concentrated effort on aggression, fluidity and ball movement. It was clear all game long that Nate was not going to put up with Houston dragging everything down. It wasn’t perfect but it was much improved. The first 4 field goals went Roy, Blake, Batum and Aldridge. Definitely more balance and movement which was lacking in Game 1. Defensively, they tried a lot of things. They keyed in on Yao Ming and Aaron Brooks. Yao got fronted, doubled, pushed and shoved. They switched a lot of screens on Brooks and concentrated on keeping him in front and out of the paint. They even tried a couple zone looks (which did not work at all, apparently Carl Landry = zone buster). They even went with Coup’s favorite tag-team, the Colossal Connection of Greg Oden and Joel Przybilla out there for defensive purposes. Some things worked and some didn’t, but you have to give Nate McMillan an A+ tonight. He wasn’t just going to sit back and let things happen, he went out and made things happen. He was going to give his team the best chance to win. He played chess with Adelman all night. And not only that but he also had this team ready to go. Hats off to the coach.

Sticking with talking about defense, things were a lot better tonight. Again, there was nowhere to go but up…but still. The energy and activity showed early and carried on throughout the game. Batum set the tone right off the bat by blocking Artest’s shot to start the game . Looking at the Rockets’ shot chart, it looks as if they got very few points in the paint which is an encouraging sign for Portland. There are still some holes that need to be worked on. I still am a little wary about Yao Ming. Sure he only had 11 points but he only shot the ball 6 times. Portland did a better job defensively but let’s be honest a lot of Yao’s low-point total had to do with lack of touches. I guarantee that doesn’t happen in Game 3. Also if anyone noticed the Houston offense before Ron-Ron came back in. It was throw it into Yao, watch the defense rotate and kick it out. We were at Houston’s will early there in the fourth. Wafer got at least a couple buckets because the defense had to rotate to him. Also, Aaron Brooks still scares me. I don’t want him touching the ball in the last 12 minutes in their building. His 23 points are a bit inflated because of his late explosion but the fact that we’re still going under ballscreens with him just makes me scratch my head. More than anything, Portland has got to work on not fouling. I’m not saying any words about the officials, but Portland can’t afford to let the Rockets be in the penalty all night long. Portland was in the penalty 5 minutes into the first quarter and  less than 4 minutes into the second quarter. Not to mention that 8 of Houston’s first 17 points in the 4th came from the free throw line. There is already enough of a challenge ahead, no need to give them easy buckets like that. Personnally I feel like the free throws had a lot to do with Kyle Lowry and Von Wafer’s ability to have success in the second quarter. They just put their heads down in that 2nd quarter and got to the line.

 Speaking of Von Wafer….sheesh. Portland survived him trying to get revenge like The Bride in Kill Bill. 21 points for Von Wafer? Portland can’t let him get in double figures, let alone get 20. It was a struggle to keep Wafer in front as he marched to the line. And of course that allowed him to get into a groove the likes of which no one could have seen coming. I guarantee that Wafer’s strong play and Yao’s lack of offense will be things that Houston Rocket fans lean on in the upcoming days. If it weren’t for LaMarcus, Wafer may very well have ruined our season. And I would have had the unbelievable task of writing “Von Wafer ruined the Blazers season”, a sentence I would have bet a pretty penny that I would never write in my life.

Really liked the resiliency of this Blazer team. Outside of Roy and LaMarcus, no one really had a spectacular game. But they all performed. Greg Oden’s box-score will not do him justice. Behind the 6 fouls, 4 points and 4 rebounds were 2 very important plays in the fourth quarter. The tip-jam and deflection/steal of a Yao Ming entry pass. Very big plays from the rook. Travis Outlaw struggled mightily but also came through in the clutch with that big jumper and his steal/breakaway jam that (should have) sealed the game. Obviously both Oden and Outlaw have things to work on. Oden has to stay on the court and Outlaw has got to find a way to be effective. But despite their struggles both found ways to contribute which is always important. Big Joel was active all night and had some key hustles (*ahem*andflops*ahem*). Steve Blake tried his best to keep Brooks in front and had that big layup in the fourth. Rudy Fernandez was able to get free and hit big shots, kicking the fourth off with that three after Houston had closed the gap. Just a great team effort and a way to respond down 0-1.

All of this being said, tomorrow this game will officially be in the books. So soak it in while you can. The reality of the situation is this. The series is 1-1. I can’t believe I’m about to quote Kobe Bryant but every game is indeed a completely new slate. The season lies in Portland’s ability to win a game in Houston and if you remember the road record against playoff teams…yeah. They have to win a game in the Toyota Center to win this series. We’ll see how they come out on Friday night. Remember, all they need is one win in Houston. And after tonight, you’d have to believe they have the ability to do it.

Last but not least….

“For me, basketball is over.” – Dikembe Mutombo

One of the tougher moments of the night was seeing Dikembe Mutombo go down, stay down and have to get carted off on a stretcher. He’s been playing in the L since I was 4…and never have I seen him like that. It’s a shame his career didn’t end on his own terms. I also found it interesting that we all know and love that moment of Dikembe in Seattle after Denver pulled the upset, lying on the court, holding the ball in his hands with the giant grin. And his career will end with the imagery of him lying on the court, screaming in pain and agony. You’re a legend and a great human being.

Yeah, it’s bedtime.

Resliency

“Honestly there was nothing positive. I couldn’t take anything positive from that loss. We got it handed to us… There wasn’t anything good about that. They kicked our butt.” - Brandon Roy (credit: Ben from Blazer’s Edge)

It’s a new day, a new game, and hopefully after tonight we’ll be talking about this being a new series.

Disappointing, dominating, gut-wrenching, ugly, soft, inexperienced, tentative, scared. All words used to describe events that took place in Houston’s Game 1 win on Saturday. And even before one second has been played in tonight’s Game 2, there  are already two words that are attached to it: Must-win.

Everyone knows the scenario. The bright lights will shine even brighter in the Rose Garden for this Game 2. Portland finds themselves in a must-win situation tonight at home. A loss tonight brings doom to the Blazers horizon. A loss will send Houston to their home-court up 2-0 and will compeletely change the course of the Blazer post-season. A Houston win changes things from ‘if’ the Blazers will get eliminated to ‘when’ the Blazers will get eliminated. The beautiful thing about the playoffs is that momentum can swing in an instant. Don’t believe me? Ask Chicago and Dallas. Those wins on Saturday now feel miles away. The highs and lows are more intense and come way quicker than in the regular season. Gone are the days of easy opponents and huge winning streaks. It’s about competiting and dealing with adversity quickly. It is all about what you bring to the table that night. Game 1 is out of the window. It’s about focusing all of your attention on one team, breaking them down and finding a way to take something from them. In Game 1, Houston did just that. Now it’s Portland’s turn. Portland has had two days to stew in their own sick. Two days to tweak everything and make adjustments to everything that didn’t work. Two days for Nate to figure this out. And I guess the one positive about taking a beating like the one handed out on Saturday is that you can make plenty of adjustments. You’ve heard the same talk for 2 days so I won’t keep it going, but Portland is down but not out. Take Boston and San Antonio’s victories after losing Game 1′s at home. This is still a series until someone proves otherwise.

The one thing we do know is that Blazers will be ready for Game 2. The shy and tentative Blazers from Game 1 will not be allowed in the Rose Garden. There are orders for this Blazers to be pummelled with steel chairs on sight. Over the past couple of days, the chatter surrounding these two teams has been insane. Rocket fans have been gloating (try and read a Houston blog or newspaper. Try it). Blazer fans have been moping/being positive. The anticipation has been building since the buzzer sounded on Saturday night. Both teams have been saying the right things in the media, now one of them will have to do it. Portland’s statements have been obvious while Houston’s have been way more subtle. They  are continuing to say that this is ‘very much still a series’ and all of that jazz. Make no mistake about it people, Houston is a veteran team who smells blood and will be on the attack. If this were a UFC fight they definitely just cut us open right before the end of Round 1 and are looking to go for the kill. They have experienced playoff loss after playoff loss, with a chance to jump on an opponent 2-0 you go for it. And that’s exactly what they’ll be looking to do tonight. Adelman will have this team ready to play.

The best part about Game 2 is that it means Game 1 is officially, officially  in the history books. It also means the time for talking is over. We all know Portland played one of their worst games of the year on Saturday. The big question is do they have what it takes to absorb that loss and dig themselves out of this hole? Only time will tell.

Keys to success:

• Be the aggressor. Houston bullied Portland in Game 1. Not only did it just feel like that watching the game, it looked like it in the box score. 44-30 Houston on the boards and 28 FTA’s to Portland’s 16. Blazers have to come out and want this…well they have to NEED this game from the start. The aggression has to be there on both ends. The will to compete has to be there for 48 minutes because like I said, Houston is going to want this win. They are going to look to go for the knockout blow. Portland is going to have to be ready because winning will be a challenge.
• Make the right adjustments. Game 1 is done, in the history books and over with. Game 2 is a fresh new start. You now know what to expect and after two days of prep you are armed with weapons to counter-act them. Everything comes down to making key adjustments in the playoffs. To win, you make the adjustments and you take things away from your opponent. Portland has to make adjustments from Game 1 on both ends to even have a chance. Portland can come out with all of the passion, energy and fire that they want but if they don’t make the right adjustments they won’t win. Offensively, they have to open everything back up and not settle. Defensively, they have to take Houston out of their rhythm. These adjustments need to be made for Portland to win this game.
• Take Yao out of his rhythm. Again, the challenge of figuring out how to stop Yao Ming is one of the biggest keys to the Blazers success. I never felt like the defense on him was atrocious on Saturday night, more like he just made huge plays. Superstars sometimes just show up like that. Odd since he’s traditionally struggled against us all year. Portland isn’t going to stop him, but they can disrupt him. If Portland can get him putting up 15-16 shot attempts or in foul trouble and disrupt his rhythm they should be on their way. And remember, as Yao goes the Rockets tend to go offensively. Portland will have to figure out how to take him away and they will have to do it fast. If they can prove that they can take Yao out of the equation, they can spread some doubt in the minds of the uber-confident Rockets.
• Contain Aaron Brooks. If he averages 20+ this series, Portland has no chance. Including Saturday night’s win, when Brooks scores 16+ points the Rockets are 17-4 on the year. You can see what stopping him is almost as important as stopping Yao. And realistically, it could be more important than stopping Yao. Stopping Brooks will eliminate their third scoring option. It will also eliminate a perimeter player who can create his own shot at will, which has supposedly been one of the Rockets weakness. I’m not too worried about Artest because crazy people can’t hide their crazy forever. Keeping Brooks in check is high on the priority list in my book, and it will be incredibly difficult because of his confidence and Blake’s lack of foot-speed. Is Bayless the answer? I’m not sure. We’ll find out, hopefully we won’t find out too late.
• Movement on offense. This is a major key for Portland and while it sounds general it is very true.  The offense was very stagnant on Saturday night. There were a ton of reasons for this. Too much 1-0n-1, too many guys tentative, not enough ball movement. Roy had to be too much of a scorer and not enough of a facilitator. Too much settling and too much of the Rockets dictating. It was one of the worst offensive performances of the season. Simply put, the Blazers have to play Blazer basketball. And Blazer Basketball isn’t 41% from the field and 9% from the three point line. Blazer Basketball isn’t Channing Frye jumpers or Sergio Rodriguez recklessly taking it at Dikembe Mutombo. It isn’t Rudy holding the ball and deciding to shoot a three because no one is open. All those things and some took place Saturday night.
• Help the stars. Roy and LaMarcus have tough matchups. Someone has to step up and put pressure on the rest of Houston’s defense. Steve Blake, Rudy Fernandez and Travis Outlaw are going to have to be those guys. We need Blake and Rudy’s shooting ability and Travis’ ability to create his own shot. Everyone should be loose and in attack mode. Speaking of which…
• LaMarcus Aldridge must go to work. This isn’t the sole offensive key but I find this to be one of the most important. He has got to figure out his match-up with Scola and the physical bigs. Honestly, Portland can’t win this series with LaMarcus Aldridge playing the way we all know he can. They can’t. The Blazers are going to give him the ball, we know this. But if he keeps struggling to get to the paint and ends up dribbling, the offense will get bogged-down. Then it turns into a 1-on-1 fest trying to get him going in addition to relying on Roy. He has to be the LMA that we saw the second half of the season and take over. Hopefully that chip on his shoulder will be Gilbert-sized on Tuesday night.
• Shut their bench down. If Von Wafer, Kyle Lowry and co. give productive minutes or score big points, things probably will end up bad.
• Get your swagger back. The Blazers had no swag on Saturday night. None. They looked like 16 year old boys trying to ask girls to homecoming. Houston was like Razor Ramon, just out there oozing machismo. They had their bully swag going and it didn’t seem like Portland was in their league. Time to get the swag back up. No need to be scurred, it can’t get worse than Game 1. Play with reckless abandon, be the youthful yet mature team that you have been all season. No need to get caught up in the playoffs and start wearing suits to games or wear black shoes and black socks. Just….do you.

7:00. Rose Garden. NBA TV. Be there. It’s time to see if Portland can wiggle their big toe.

• We’re in the playoffs. I know expectations are raised and what not…but honestly would you rather be down 0-1 in a best-of-7 series, or heading to Lottery-ville, watching these playoffs, thinking about what could have been and pondering ‘could James Harden work?’. Exactly, and yes that was a shoutout.
• Eight teams are down 0-1. Three other teams are in the same exact situation as Portland, having lost home-court advantage. Unfortunate? Yes. End of the world? No. Riddle me this, would you rather be in Magic, Celtics or Spurs fans shoes right now? I’m not too sure you would. Think about it…Portland played arguably one of their worst games of the year while Houston played one of their best. On the flipside, San Antonio blew a 13-point lead, Orlando blew an 18-point lead and Boston saw a free throw rattle in and out and had to watch Tyrus Thomas hit jumpers. I will gladly take the blowout loss, much easier to recover from than those losses I described.
• The Utah Jazz are getting demolished in ways we haven’t seen in a while. Always, always fun to see the Jazz go down…even if the Lakers win. I mean, thank goodness we aren’t the Utah Jazz or Detroit Pistons right now. Yikes. They are just in absolute dead-end situations. Again, I’d rather have to pull a Jesse Jackson and keep hope alive than be doomed to my fate.
• Chris Andersen is not on the Blazers roster. That should make you feel better.
• No matter what The Dream Shake tries to sell you, Houston cannot play much better than this. They can’t. And if they do well then hey….they just deserve it. But they can’t. So, boom.
• Channing Frye is returning to the bench. So no more watching him taking jumpers and getting beasted in the post. No more wondering why he is even on the court. No more praying he will get off the court. That should make you feel better.
• A completely different Blazer team should show up for Game 2. Sometimes in a fight you have to see your own blood before you open up a few cans of whoop-ass. Nobody makes us bleed our own blood. Nobody.
• Houston still hasn’t gotten out of the first round since 1997, we still got that going for us. They are known to get tight. Maybe that will get you in a comfort zone?
• The series is far from over.
• It can’t get worse than Saturday night.

And if none of those things make you feel better…well…..last resort……watch this. I wanted to embed it but it was disabled (curse words) so off you go. If Bill Cosby trying to salsa and shimmying can’t perk you up then I don’t know what to tell you.