Good that Phoenix seems to be out and other teams have harder remaining schedules

In the second half we played solid high energy defense and we won the 3rd and 4th quarters. In the first half the Blazers didn’t come out with a defensive mindset and allowed the Mavs to get the shots they wanted. If we had played d like we did in the second half we would win that game. Same thing has happened numerous times this year, but we have usually been able to overcome early defensive lapses.

Down the stretch blake passed up a couple open 3 point shots then we settled for long contested 2 point shots.

Brandon was sick.

we did not go to lma enough

If travis isnt bumped or falls after his steal we have a good chance to win this game.

Rudy might have helped busting the Zone.

Greg would have been able to get us some more boards and mabey get dampier into foul trouble. We missed him cause when joel went out we lacked on rebounds.

They beat us 3 straight times. That’s not enough to draw conclusions, especially since we beat them twice last year when we were clearly the inferior team.

This was a bad loss, plain and simple. With Dallas on a back-2-back and our home record, I figured we had at least a 75% chance to win this one. This really needed to be a win, and this loss vastly increases our chances at a first round matchup starting at Staples.

This was a huge, huge game, and the Blazers blew it.

None of our PGs can play together, at least not judging by tonight. We need Roy and Rudy both healthy. Next year we could possibly play Martell as a big 2 and have Batum at 3, switching them on defense if needed. But we definitely need 2 of those 3 healthy to have a good back court. Webster is out for the year, which means Rudy and Roy NEED to both be healthy at the end of the season.

I still don’t think Bayless is the answer. I’m giving Sergio one more summer to become more consistent on his shot. If there isn’t noticeable improvement, he’s not the answer either.

Blake did something he shouldn’t have done. Try to be a playmaker. He usually plays within his skill set and doesn’t do more than he is capable of. Unfortunately, he made the poor decision to be a playmaker on a fast break. Two things he does not do well even in non-pressure situations.

…had a rough game. Let’s not forget that he kept us in it in the first quarter, though. 3-4 from the arc, I believe.

For whatever reason, we do not matchup well with the Mavs. I don’t think we can draw a whole lot of conclusions about our players from this game.

Sh*t happens.

I actually expected it. Blazer were unsurprisingly flat after the laker game. We will blow out the Nets on Friday. Book it!

Oh and…..

BLAME KGW!!!!!!!!!!!!!

comes from the fact that this loss is evidence that we’re not there yet.

After the LA game, a lot of people got excited about the Blazers proving they’re a top level team. A win tonight would have confirmed it, but a loss just reminds everyone that we’re not there yet. i’m alright with that, but a win would have been great, obviously.

We won every quarter but the second. We lost the game in that second quarter. The whole game felt like we were just ready to boil. Ready to explode. Just one blocked shot, one breakaway dunk, one big 3 pointer away from the roof coming off the RG and the team feeding off that energy and running away with the game. But that big momentum swing never came. It was close, but it never happened.

We really played pretty good defense tonight ( when we didn’t get confused by the excellent Dallas ball movement and consequential switches as a result ). We were closing out on shooters pretty well, protecting the paint, and forcing contested jumpshots. Those damned jump shots just kept falling! Over and over they fell. This is what it must have felt like to lose to the blazers last year when we lived and died by the jumper. I’m going to have nightmares about Dirk’s ugly ass, contested, off balance, fade away jumper falling time and time again. This would have been a different game if he wasn’t so on.

We had it! We had this game in the bag. I honestly wasn’t worried at the half. I thought to myself, " we played really poorly in the first half. We’re gonna turn it on in the second." We did turn it on. We outplayed, outscored, and out defended them in the second half. We went on our run to close the gap to 3 points with 8 minutes to go in the game. Then we fell completely flat. We couldn’t buy a bucket. Contested jumper after contested jumper. There was a 4 minute scoring drought.

Ugh. This one hurts.

And we didn’t see him until there were 5 seconds left in the game. I mean, didn’t he help lead us back from the brink again? We can afford to leave Travis out until the fourth quarter if Nicolas is cooking. Anyway, everyone knows that Travis is much better in the fourth.

Oden hurt, which means Frye gets minutes, and that’s NEVER a good idea. Brandon was pretty clearly sick. Rex was sick. Sergio seems to have a severe case of vertigo that makes it impossible to shoot the ball. Rudy was out. Blake had a hurt shooting hand.

They kept it close and were in the game into the last minute. What more could you want, given that set of unfortunates?

Don’t sweat this one too much. Just gotta make sure to take care of biz with the Nets. THAT one there is no excuse to lose… Lots of excuses for this one.

P.S. Don’t dread the Lakers. The Jazz are the team that should be scaring the pee out of ya…

then I wonder what kind of loss you would consider a big deal.

he was the guy who would have won that game.. they really have no one who can stop him if he gets moving..

i also love that the RG is trying to phase out ‘I love LA’ in favor of L-Train when he scores..

Lamarcus needs a nickname that he doesn’t have to change for different teams..