The Portland Trail Blazers took care of business in Indiana, defeating the Pacers 103-93. The Blazers’ bench was the story of the game. Here are three takeaways.
The Portland Trail Blazers improve to 4-2 on the year in their win over the Indiana Pacers, 103-93. The Blazers’ bench helped keep Portland in the game to put them into position to snatch it away from Indiana in the closing minutes.
Here are three takeaways from the contest:
Zach Collins is the man.
This was Zach Collins’s game. Throughout the contest, he was engaged, talking on defense and making strong post moves down low.
He tied a career-high with 17 points with three rebounds and three assists. Collins was accurate on offense (7/10) and a menace defensively. Collins was a major reason Damian Lillard did not need to have another 40 point game.
Once again, Collins closed out a game for the Blazers rather than starting Jusuf Nurkic. If Collins continues fouling less than Nurkic on defense and stretching the floor better on offense (even though Nurk did hit his first three-pointer of his career tonight), he may get the nod for some starts.
Bench kept Blazers in the game
The Blazers’ bench outworked the Indiana Pacers’. Portland does have a decent bench (they rank ninth in second chance points), but tonight they did their best we-have-Louis-Williams-on-the-bench impression. They scored 54 points as a unit in the win.
Caleb Swanigan had what could be called a breakout game, busting out a double-double with 11 points and 10 boards. He had logged zero points and zero rebounds in his previous three minutes of action over this season.
Nik Stauskas dropped in 10, including a two-for-three night from deep.
No doubt, the Blazers should be proud of their bench this season. They team seems to have more depth than people realized.
But maybe, with Maurice Harkless still out from injury, Head Coach Terry Stotts should experiment with making the starting lineup more potent. Perhaps a Jake Layman move is in order.
Good thing the Blazers are a solid rebounding team…
The Blazers, again, were guilty of coughing the ball up too often. They finished the game with 18 turnovers to Indiana’s eight. Normally, you don’t get the luxury of winning a game by double-digits when you lose the turnover battle this badly.
Thankfully, the Blazers outrebounded the Pacers 50-35. Portland consistently cleaned up the glass and forced Indiana to wallow in their 41.1 percent field goal shooting.
However, the Blazers must clean up their ball-handling to be a real threat in the West. Better, faster teams will take more advantage of Portland’s mistakes. Tonight, many of their turnovers looked the result of laziness or carelessness rather than aggressiveness.
Turnovers are bound to happen when you’re committed to moving the ball more.
What I’m saying is: I would be more okay with this team’s turnovers if it looked like they were trying to move the ball more than they do.
Rebounding well is one part of the puzzle to becoming, statistically speaking, a really strong piece. Limiting turnovers is just as important.
The Portland Trail Blazers play their next game against the Houston Rockets on October 30 at 5:00 P.S.T.