![]() and Gordon within the first 90 seconds of play. ![]() Lillard and Covington took charges on Porter, Jr. The Blazers came out in the third ready to go. Lillard had 18 points at the half, Porter, Jr. When McCollum hit a running bank shot at the buzzer, the Blazers trailed 65-62.a minor miracle, all things considered. Then it got even better, as Portland started forcing turnovers and converting on the break. Improbably, the Blazers got the margin within 6 with 2:00 left. Powell and McCollum helped with several buckets. Damian Lillard came alive and spurred a 14-0 run. When they weren’t watching the ball clank and roll off the hoop, they were turning it over before they even got there. Before you could say, “Wha hoppened?” Portland was down 20. The Blazers kept firing threes of their own. The Nuggets kept raining threes on Portland’s second unit, who looked helpless to stop them, pained even to respond. McCollum struck back with a couple buckets, but no single Blazer was going to be enough to match Denver’s attack. He looked seven feet taller than anybody guarding him, converting without concern. opened the second quarter stroking a three, illustrating Portland’s defensive issues and Denver’s relaxed ease. The Nuggets ended up hitting 7 threes in the period, Portland only 2. Nikola Jokic, Facu Campazzo, Michael Porter, Jr., everybody was scoring. By that time Denver was like butter on a roll. They didn’t make a real bucket until the clock read 6:25, when Robert Covington got loose in the lane. Their second score came on a goaltend of a Norman Powell layup. The Blazers finally got their first point at the 7:53 mark on a free throw after an Illegal Defense call on Denver. As the Blazers bricked their first 8 shots, the Nuggets opened up a 10-0 lead. Jusuf Nurkic went scoreless on three fairly makeable conversions. Unfortunately the Blazers were ice cold on offense, missing easy shots and hard. Portland forced him to go away from the basket instead of towards it once he received the ball. Denver tried to run the offense through Aaron Gordon but he couldn’t deliver. The Blazers opened the game with a new wrinkle: stiff defense! They made the Nuggets waste dribbles and passes. But Lillard’s teammates came up woefully short, missing rotations and easy scoring plays in the double-OT thriller, leaving the Blazers down 147-140 in the game, 2-3 in the best-of-seven series. When the smoke cleared, Lillard had the best performance in Blazers playoffs history with 55 points on 17-24 shooting, an NBA record 12-17 from distance, with 10 assists. Portland ate away at the increasingly-complacent Nuggets, then Damian Lillard went nuclear, posting an amazing performance culminating in 17 straight points over two overtimes.a feat impossible to describe. Denver’s mission to capture advantage in the series seemed secure.īut a funny thing happened on the way to the rout. With defense as porous as a broken screen door and offense as dry as the Sahara, the Blazers dug themselves a 20-point deficit by the second period. The Knicks would go on to lose in the Finals to Hall of Famer George Mikan's Minneapolis Lakers in a nightmare matchup for Celtics fans.Needing a win, the Portland Trail Blazers came out with their pants full of soup in Game 5 of their series against the Denver Nuggets. The NBA had 10 teams, with only two - the Celtics and the Knicks - still in their original cities today.The three-point shot was a mere 26 years away.Eventual Celtics legends and Hall of Famers Tommy Heinsohn (Holy Cross) and Bill Russell (University of San Francisco) would begin their COLLEGE basketball careers that fall.And Red Auerbach, in his third season with the Celtics, had zero of the nine NBA titles he would win as a coach.They were four years away from their first. The Celtics had won zero of their 17 NBA titles.He set NBA Playoff records by attempting 32 free throws and making 30 of them. 2/2 4OT Playoff game: Boston 111, Syracuse 105 (3/21/53) Once Boston had the lead, head coach Red Auerbach ordered his team to keep the ball in Bob Cousy's hands, and Cooz dribbled until he was fouled.
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