Wrap up the game-related discussion right here until the recap and Media Row Report are up. Hope you enjoyed the evening!
--Dave (blazersub@yahoo.com)
UPDATE:
Well, jolly. The good folks at DirecTV apparently had a major guide-related snafu tonight right as halftime hit. What does DirecTV's program guide have to do with the Blazers, you ask? Well, it's how the Tivo knows to record programs. And when the guide switched from "Warriors vs. Blazers" to "Upcoming: Suns vs. Rockets" my Tivo figured that its job was done for the night and shut off. So your friendly neighborhood blogger only got to see two quarters of this win. That's the second straight game I haven't been able to cover which hasn't happen to me ever. So we're going to depend on you, especially those of you who were in attendance tonight, to fill in until Ben gets his Media Row Report up.
As far as what I was able to see, in the first quarter the Blazers (sans LaMarcus Aldridge and Steve Blake tonight) got picked apart defensively, rebounded poorly, and lost control of the tempo resulting in a Golden State scoring fest. The Warriors shot around 70% and scored 41. They didn't care a bit that Portland scored 31. It was their kind of game.
In the second quarter Portland tightened up the board work and regained control of the tempo, hampering the Warriors' scoring ability. Golden State wasn't hitting their jumpers. Portland started attacking the rim more. The game turned around on a dime.
Throughout guys like Andre Miller and Juwan Howard were stepping up, proving the value of having people who have been there before. Without Aldridge this team was scraping the bottom of the barrel tonight. You couldn't get much deeper into the roster and still call it a roster. But Miller and Howard responded to the opportunity...Miller obviously and Howard in more subtle fashion. On a normal night you'd scream about Andre taking as big of a slice out of the offense as he did but this night wasn't normal, eh?
The fact that the Blazers did pull out the win, especially after that kind of start, is incredible. Holding the Warriors under 20 for three straight quarters is like fitting Pamela Anderson into a training bra. But the Blazers managed it.
Fill in the details and observations from the second half below.
Check out the results from tonight's Jersey Contest here. You can enter the next game here. Congratulations to DarkWebs, who to nobody's surprise walked away with the December Jersey. You can see the final December standings here.