LaMarcus Aldridge capped off a 29-point night on a game-winning jumper with 2.4 seconds remaining as the Portland Trail Blazers rallied to a 103-101 victory over the Milwaukee Bucks on Friday night.
With score tied at 101 with 20.1 seconds remaining, Brandon Roy held the ball for the last shot. He drove to the hoop and passed to Aldridge, who hit the jumper on the baseline to give Portland the victory.
Aldridge made 14 of his 20 shot attempts, grabbed six rebounds and had four assists. Roy notched another double-double with 20 points and 10 assists. Roy also had three steals.
Roy was proud of Aldridge for hitting that last shot, as Roy himself has often been the one to take the big shot in crunch time.
"LaMarcus was ready for his opportunity tonight," Roy said. "He made shot after shot for us tonight. On that last play I couldn't have found a better guy to pass it to. He was confident and from the minute it left his hand I knew it was good."
Steve Blake had 21 points and six assists and Martell Webster stepped up with 17 points and seven rebounds. Joel Przybilla owned the paint with 15 rebounds and three blocks.
Michael Redd led the short-handed Bucks with 25 points and Charlie Villanueva added 16 points.
The Bucks were without starting guard Mo Williams, who missed his second straight game with an abdominal strain, and rookie forward Yi Jianlian, who also missed his second straight game with a sprained ankle.
The Bucks used an 11-2 run to start the fourth quarter to grab an 89-81 lead with 7:30 remaining when Royal Ivey scored on a layin.
Portland fought back to grab a 92-91 lead with 3:45 remaining when Aldridge hit the second of two short jumpers. James Jones then hit a 3-pointer from the corner to give Portland a 95-91 lead.
Aldridge hit a short hook shot to extend the lead to 97-91. Redd followed with a driving layup and then scored again with 1:26 remaining to make it 97-95.
Roy hit a short baseline jumper to make it 99-95 with 1:20 remaining.
Redd scored and was fouled with 1:04 remaining. He hit the free throw to make the score 98-97. Webster was able to score on a reverse lay up with 52.5 seconds remaining to extend the lead to 101-98.
Redd scored on a driving layup with 43.6 seconds remaining to make the score 101-100.
Blake missed a jumper with 27.3 second remaining. After a 20-second timeout, Roy was called for a foul trying to deny Redd the ball. Redd, a career 85% shooter from the free throw line, hit just one of two free throws to tie the game at 101-101.
The Trail Blazers were incredibly accurate, hitting 54% of their shots and 8-of-16 three-point attempts.
The Trail Blazers are now 4-0 in games that Steve Blake scores 19 or more points. Two of those games have come against the Bucks.
The Trail Blazers next travel to New York to face Zach Randolph and the Knicks on Saturday night. The game is at 4:30 p.m. PST and will be broadcast on KGW. As always, the game can be heard on 750am KXL.
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