The Portland Trail Blazers (1-1) followed the lead of Brandon Roy on Tuesday night, and evened their first round series at one game apiece with a 107-103 victory over the Houston Rockets (1-1) in front of 20,408 screaming fans at the Rose Garden.
Roy finished Game Two with 42 points, tied with Clyde Drexler for the second-most by a Trail Blazer in a playoff game.
Roy got his first two points on Portland’s first offensive possession, hitting a 19-foot jumper at the 11:35 mark of the first quarter, putting the Trail Blazers ahead 2-0. Houston leaned heavily on the offensive efforts of Ron Artest in the first quarter, getting a 24-foot three-pointer from the guard with 3:43 remaining in the opening period, giving the visiting team a 22-17 advantage. Portland battled back, getting a 13-foot turnaround jumper from LaMarcus Aldridge making the score 24-20 in favor of the Rockets with 2:03 remaining in the first quarter.
A scary moment happened at the 1:17 mark in the opening period. Houston’s back-up center Dikembe Mutombo came down awkwardly on his left knee, and was on the Rose Garden floor for almost five minutes. The 18-year veteran was taken off the floor in a stretcher and did not return. Mutombo will be evaluated on the Rocket’s return to Houston.
Roy gave Portland back the lead at 28-26 with a three-pointer with 1.6 seconds remaining in the first period. Roy finished with 10 points in the opening 12 minutes. Artest lead all scorers with 15 points through one quarter.
Tuesday’s second quarter belonged to Aldridge. Coming off one of his worst performances of the season, the third year power forward connected on all six of his second quarter field goal attempts. Aldridge put home a 10-foot turnaround jumper with 7:25 remaining in the opening half, giving the Trail Blazers a 36-34 lead. Houston battled back, taking a 49-45 lead on a 24-foot three-pointer from former Trail Blazer Von Wafer with 3:26 remaining in the second quarter.
Aldridge and Roy took over as the half wound down, combing for all six of Portland’s final points in the second quarter. Roy put down a fast break lay-up with 1:20 remaining in the half, and the home team took a 53-51 advantage into the halftime locker room.
Aldridge finished with 12 points in the second quarter for 16 in the opening half, and Roy contributed nine points in the second for 19 at the half.
Houston came out of halftime looking to gain back the lead and put the Trail Blazers away. Luis Scola scored a driving lay-up with 7:41 to play in the third quarter, giving the Rockets their largest lead of the night at 63-56. Portland responded with a 16-2 run, capped by a 21-footer from Aldridge, to take a 72-65 lead with 1:40 remaining in the third period. Houston finished the quarter with seven straight points, and the game was knotted at 72-72 entering the final quarter of the evening.
Portland was outscored 21-19 by Houston in the third quarter, but got 11 points from Roy.
Rudy Fernandez provided a spark at the beginning of the night’s final period. The Spanish rookie nailed a 24-foot three-pointer, giving the Trail Blazers the lead at 75-72 with 11:29 to play on the night. Yao Ming gave Houston back the lead at 89-87 with two made free throws with 5:00 to play on the night.
From that point it was all Portland. Travis Outlaw poked the ball away from Scola on a bad pass from Aaron Brooks, and raced the length of the court for a dunk, matching the Trail Blazers their largest lead of the night at 98-90 with 1:03 remaining. Fernandez, Roy, Aldridge, and Outlaw closed the game at the free throw line, overcoming eight points in the final 12.9 seconds from Brooks.
“I feel like we adjusted well tonight,” Roy said. “Me and LaMarcus wanted to try and lead by example. It’s our first playoff win, so we’re pretty excited about it.”
Aldridge shot 11-of-19 from the field to finish with 27 points, and added 12 rebounds for his first playoff double-double. Steve Blake contributed 10 points, and Fernandez led the Portland bench with 11 points.
The Trail Blazers continue their opening round series on Friday at Houston.
NATE MCMILLAN
“I thought Brandon played a really good game, especially for the playoff atmosphere with so much on the line. Nothing was forced. He seemed to have a calm. Ron Artest is an unbelievable defender. But Brandon showed the kind of player he has become.
“I thought both Roy and Aldridge were major factors. We need those guys to score. If these two guys aren’t scoring it makes us really tough on us. We also need other guys to score and I thought tonight we got a pretty good lift from Rudy (his three-pointer and his key steal were big).
“Defensively we did what I hoped we could do---that we could guard them. For the most part I thought we did that. We contained Artest after his strong start, and we did a good job on Scola and Yao Ming. Von (Wafer) had a good game against us but for the most part we showed that we could stop them.
“I thought we had to do those things to give ourselves confidence and to believe we can win. If we go into a game doubting ourselves, we have little chance. Now, as we go to Houston (for Games 3 and 4), we have a shot. Tonight we just did a better job defensively, we were aggressive, and we got big games from our two top scorers. We also improved on following our game plan. In Game 1 after looking at the video, it was clear we didn’t follow our game plan at all. Tonight we got much better movement, we weren’t standing around ball-watching Brandon and we had a lot more screens to open things up for our shooters.”
them. I think we’re going to need our best shot. They’ll be even more aggressive in Game Two. Tonight we didn’t control the ball at all. It allowed a lot of their players to have wide-open looks.”
BRANDON ROY
“I feel like we adjusted well tonight. But the biggest thing is that our ‘bigs’ were physical with them. We rotated different guys---LaMarcus, Greg, Joel---and gave them different looks and double-teamed them when we had to and just really tried to attack them offensively and get them in foul trouble. We were successful with that tonight.
“The last game I shot one free throw and tonight I shot 12. I felt like I was aggressive last game. Its just that tonight everybody came aggressive. We had our guards taking shots that they normally take and LaMarcus did a great job of dominating the paint, not only scoring but rebounding the basketball. Its what we needed. Me and LaMarcus are the captains of the team. We wanted to try to lead by example tonight. Its our first playoff win so we’re pretty excited about it.
“That was a big play for us (Greg Oden’s dunk with 4:45 remaining that tied it at 89-89---the Rockets wouldn’t have the lead again.) Last game we didn’t get any offensive rebounds it seemed like. That was big because I shot it short and I thought they were going to get the board, and I thought it was a bad possession but Greg came in and nobody boxed him out. That was big for our confidence. I think that was the play that we really needed.”
GREG ODEN
“It felt good. We can definitely say we got one. We need every one. We’re definitely trying to make it to the next round so any win we get we’ll take. We definitely tried to bounce back from the first one. We had to get this. The guys were playing really well. It puts the ease on us when we’re in foul trouble and we know we got guys who can come in a play really well.”
LAMARCUS ALDRIDGE
“We were trying to be more confident. Last game they had some schemes that had me thinking too much. I think tonight I just took my shots. Whatever they gave me, I just took it where as last game I think I was trying to force things.
“I think they (the Rockets) do a good job of closing down the paint. Last game every time I drove Coach told me four or five guys were right there. So tonight I just took my jump shot more.
“I think this game was huge for us (in reference to the next two in Texas). Everything’s going to carry over to the games in Houston. Now we know what we have to do. We have to be physical with these guys and play with confidence.
• Brandon Roy’s 42 points are tied for the second-most by a Trail Blazer in the playoffs (45, Bonzi Wells, 4/23/03 at Dallas; 42, Clyde Drexler, 4/29/92 at L.A. Lakers) and the most in franchise history by a player in his first career playoff series … Roy became just the fifth Trail Blazer in franchise history to score 40 points in a playoff game … Roy’s 15 field goals were one short of a franchise high for a postseason game … His 42 points are tied for the most by a player in the 2009 playoffs (Ben Gordon, Chicago) … Roy counted nine or more points in every quarter.
• The Trail Blazers are now 20-1 all-time in the second game of playoff series at home … Portland has never lost both Games 1 and 2 of any series at home.
• The Trail Blazers used a 16-2 run to take a 72-65 lead with 1:40 remaining in the third quarter, turning Houston’s biggest lead of the game into Portland’s largest advantage of the game at the time ... Neither team led the entire way by more than eight points.
• LaMarcus Aldridge made all six of his second-quarter shot attempts, finishing the quarter with a team-high 12 points and a run of seven straight makes spanning back to the first quarter ... Aldridge scored eight straight Portland points from the 4:19 mark to the 4:30 mark … Aldridge matched his regular season high with three blocks.
• Portland’s 15 defensive rebounds in the first half matched its total from all of Game 1, a franchise low for a playoff game ... The Rockets had just one first-half offensive rebound and four overall.
• The Trail Blazers equaled their regular season lows with six turnovers and 11 assists ... Portland has just 15 turnovers and 23 assists combined in two playoff games.
• Counting the playoffs, the Trail Blazers are now 27-0 when leading at halftime at the Rose Garden this season.
• The game featured only one steal (Rudy Fernandez) through three quarters and 10 total turnovers.
• In the first half, Portland outscored Houston in the paint, 22-10.
• In two games in the series, Aaron Brooks has led the Rockets with 50 points (19-29 FG, 9-13 3-PT) and 12 assists … He has led Houston in scoring and assists in both games ... Brooks had 21 of his 23 points tonight in the second half.
• With a tip-in in the first quarter, Yao Ming made his 10th straight field goal attempt to begin the series ... He is 11-11 from the foul line in two games in the series.
• Ron Artest scored 15 of Houston’s first 24 points in the game (all in the first quarter) ... He had four points in the last three quarters.
• Von Wafer’s 21 points were just two shy of his career high for a regular season game.
