Trail Blazers beat Jazz 100-81, end Utah’s 11-game winning streak

Led by CJ McCollum and Damian Lillard, the Trail Blazers play one of their best games of the season to beat the Jazz in Utah.

In their first game after the All-Star break, the Portland Trail Blazers put an emphatic end to Utah’s 11-game winning streak Friday, beating the Jazz 100-81.

It was Portland’s first win in three tries against Utah this season – and a nice little bit of payback. It was the Jazz who ended Portland’s nine-game home winning streak back on Feb. 11.

The Blazers (33-26) came out looking like a team that had just returned from vacation. The spring was back in their steps, and they were active on the boards and in the passing lanes; Portland had five steals within the first nine minutes, with Maurice Harkless grabbing four of them on his own. (He would finish with six steals.)

FIRST HALF

Let’s start with this – a pretty sweet move by Al-Farouq Aminu.

Portland had an early 21-11 lead. But the Jazz (30-29) aren’t the kind of team to go down quietly, and a 12-2 run tied the game at 23 with 2:22 left in the first.

After the first quarter, Portland had a one-point lead, 31-30.

Harkless had a vicious put-back with about 4:25 left in the second quarter.

The Blazers kept the aggressive Jazz at bay in the second quarter, taking an 11-point lead with 3:13 left in the half. Jusuf Nurkic got into foul trouble around that time, his third. It appeared to have been a bogus call, judging by much of the reaction on Twitter; Nurk went to the bench in a fury.

The Jazz then started to eat away at the lead, and at the half, the score was Trail Blazers 53, Jazz 47.

Good sign for the Blazers: Really balanced scoring. At halftime, it looked like this:

SECOND HALF

The Trail Blazers increased their lead to start off the third quarter, going on a 13-2 run to take a 15-point lead, 66-51.

Nurkic was especially active in the third quarter, playing strong defense and frustrating Rudy Gobert into getting T’d up by the officials.

CJ McCollum was fantastic throughout; he would finish the game with 26 points on 11-of-21 shooting.

The Blazers got the lead up to 17 before Utah made a little run to get within 12; Portland led 74-62 with 1:57 left in the third. After three, it was Blazers 80, Jazz 64.

Next: Are the Spurs now a favorable first-round opponent?

In the fourth, Utah made another little run to pull within 12 points, 84-72.

And then the Jazz pulled within nine points with less than three minutes left.

By this point, Damian Lillard had 24 points and was keeping Utah from catching up.

In fact, despite all their mini-runs, the Jazz never were able to catch up. And with the help of McCollum, the Trail Blazers pulled away for the win.

Up next: Portland heads to Phoenix Saturday to take on the Suns. Tip-off is set for 6 p.m. PST.

TAKEAWAYS

No. 1

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And No. 3