Blazers Finish Four-Game Trip With Gutsy Overtime Win in Boston

BOSTON -- The Portland Trail Blazers had already been on the road for more than a week when they arrived in Boston late Friday night for the second game of a back-to-back versus the Celtics Saturday afternoon. Given that they had already been away from home for so long, perhaps they figured they might as well stay out just a little bit longer.It took overtime to do it, but the Trail Blazers managed to break a four-game losing streak in the last game of a four-game trip by defeating the Celtics 127-123 in front of a sellout crowd of 18,624 at TD Garden.“I’m really proud of our team,” said Trail Blazers head coach Terry Stotts. “A game like this on the heels of yesterday, short turn around, it was a game that hopefully we can build on, but we’ve had a tough stretch. Every team goes through a tough stretch. This was something we needed and is very welcome.”Portland is now 19-27 overall and 8-18 on the road this season.“Huge win, especially on this trip losing the first three,” said Damian Lillard. “Being able to be tough mentally and physically too being the last game. To pull one out like that, probably the toughest one on the trip, back-to-back, five o’clock game, but I think we showed some fight, we showed some heart, especially having to go to overtime. We played the kind of game we need to play to win games and we played how we need to play on both ends down the stretch to win games. It was a big win for us.”It looked as though Saturday’s game was going to be on the shorter end of the spectrum early on, with the Trail Blazers going down 12-6 early on to a Celtics team that hadn’t played since Wednesday.But rather than fold, Portland would respond with a 12-2 run, mostly thanks to CJ McCollum, who scored 12 points in the first quarter, to take an 18-16 lead. But the combination of five Portland turnovers leading to nine Boston points and Celtics forward Jae Crowder scoring 11 would result in the Trail Blazers entering the second quarter down 28-26.Portland would clean up the turnovers and slow Crowder in the second quarter, but whatever benefit they got from those improvements would be undone by diminutive guard Isaiah Thomas, who went 6-of-7 from the field and 3-of-4 from the free throw line for 15 points in the quarter. The Celtics as a whole would shoot 72 percent from the field while converting nine of 10 free throws to outscore the Blazers 37-30 in the quarter to take a 65-56 lead into the break. “Was definitely tough, (Thomas) is great with his change of speed,” said Evan Turner of defending his former teammate. “I think he did a great job. He obviously knows how to get calls and they run a lot of great plays for him and he can make shots in tight space so its definitely tough. It was a lot of work going back and forth.”That would would pay off in the third quarter. Portland started the half on an 11-2 run to tie the game at 67-67 four minutes into the second half. A few minutes, the Trail Blazers would go on an 11-0 run to take a 78-72 lead after a Mason Plumlee reverse layup at the 4:38 mark of the third. Boston would battle back in the final four minutes of the quarter and even reclaimed the lead before a Meyers Leonard three, one of four that he made Saturday night, give Portland an 88-86 lead going into the fourth. The game would remain close throughout the fourth, as evidenced by six ties and four lead changes in the quarter. So with how close the game had been, it should have been a surprise to see Boston guard Terry Rozier hit a three-pointer off an inbounds pass to tie the game at 113-113 with 8.4 seconds to play.“Well I had to screen for (Thomas), because you know a lot of attention is on (Thomas),” said Rozier of the game-tying shot. “Then he came back and screened back for me and I was open as soon as I caught... And I let it fly. Coach drew up a play for me and it felt good to see the ball go in.”Damian Lillard would have a chance to win the game in regulation, though his stepback midrange jumper over Marcus Smart missed the mark as time expired, sending the game to overtime.Portland took their first lead of the overtime at 115-113 after two McCollum free throws with 4:17 to play in the extra period and held that lead for the next three minutes until a Thomas three with 1:24 to play put the Celtics up one.But unlike the night before in Philadelphia, the Trail Blazers would make their free throws during the stretch run, with Al-Farouq Aminu, Plumlee and Lillard combining to go 6-of-7 from the line to put the game away. “I know I didn’t miss the free throw (versus the 76ers) out of fear or worry or anything like that, I just left it short,” said Lillard. “I think that’s what bothered me the most, that I had an opportunity to put our team in a better position and I didn’t. So tonight I wouldn’t say I was thinking about it like that but as I walked to the line I was like, it’s a similar situation, but that was it.”The Trail Blazers were led by McCollum, who score 26 points in the first half on the way to finishing the game with 35 points on 11-of-21 shooting from the field, 3-of-6 shooting from three and 10-of-13 shooting from the free throw line.“I didn’t play particularly well the last three games, especially in Philly,” said McCollum, who also added three assists, three steals and two rebounds in nearly 46 minutes. “I had a lot of people come out to see me and I was disappointing, so I wanted to be aggressive tonight and just try to be efficient knowing my team needs me to score and need me to make plays for us to have a chance to win games.”Lillard went just 9-of-21 from the field but went a perfect 8-of-8 from the free throw line to finish with 28 points while adding seven assists in 37 minutes. Leonard had his best game in recent memory, going 6-of-7 from the field and 4-of-4 from three for 17 points to go with four rebounds in 24 minutes.“The past couple days I’ve watched film and tried to continue to work as much as I can on my shot and it’s feeling much better, much more fluid,” said Leonard. “My goal is continue to work and kind of weather the storm individually because I know I can help this team in many ways, not just on the offensive end.”Turner, playing in his first game against his old team since signing this offseason with Portland, added 12 points, four rebounds and four assists in 40 minutes.Mason Plumlee came within a few assists of a triple-double, finishing with 10 points, 11 rebounds and eight assists in 27 minutes. Aminu came off the bench for the second-straight game and finished with 11 points and seven rebounds in 36 minutes.The Celtics were led by Thomas, who went 14-of-28 from the field and 9-of-11 from the free throw line for 41 points while also tallying six assists and three rebounds.Al Horford and Marcus Smart both finished with 17 points, Crowder added 16 and Rozier scored 15 off the bench.With the trip now over, the Trail Blazers take the long flight back to Portland and have the next three days off before hosting the Los Angeles Lakers.