The Portland Trail Blazers' experience from last season has them guarding against complacency.The surprising Atlanta Hawks may be well advised to heed that warning.After matching their record from this point last season, the Trail Blazers go for an eighth straight home win Saturday night against the Hawks in a matchup of two of the NBA's top teams.Portland is 26-7 after 33 games for the second straight season, but the team went 28-21 the rest of the way in 2013-14 to finish fifth in the Western Conference."Last year, I think we were just excited about such a great start and I don't think we did a good enough job of sticking to what we did leading up to that point," guard Damian Lillard said. "This year, I think we're more committed to that because of how much more we're committed and how much better we understand what it takes. I think we'll be able to sustain."The Trail Blazers have certainly looked capable of that while going 15-2 at home, holding opponents to 92.2 points per game.They're limiting foes to an average of 90.9 points and 26.7 percent from long range while winning seven straight there.Portland won eight straight on its own floor from Nov. 8-Dec. 6, 2013, and moved closer to that after Lillard's 26 points and nine assists sparked a 102-97 overtime win over East-leading Toronto on Tuesday.The Hawks (24-8) are atop the Southeast Division after finishing 38-44 last season and being ousted in the first round of the playoffs for the third straight year.Atlanta, though, has won 19 of 22 games, including nine of 10 on the road.The Hawks made it five straight as the visitor - and six straight overall against the West - by holding Utah to 37.2 percent shooting in a 98-92 win on Friday."We just acted defensively," said guard Jeff Teague, who had game highs of 26 points and eight assists. "Getting deflections. Getting steals. It led to some easy offensive points for us."The Hawks could use another strong defensive performance as they go for their first six-game road winning streak since Jan. 2-22, 2011.Teague has averaged 24.7 points while hitting 54.5 percent from the field as the Hawks have won three straight overall, but building on that in Portland will be tough. He's made 27.0 percent from the floor while averaging 7.5 points in four games there.Al Horford has missed five of the past seven meetings with the Trail Blazers, totaling 30 points and 27 rebounds in the other two.Portland has won three straight matchups with the Hawks, who have averaged just 85.3 points while connecting on 20.5 percent from long range.
LaMarcus Aldridge spurred a 100-85 win at Atlanta on March 27, putting up 25 points and pulling down 16 boards.The forward missed three of four games with a respiratory illness before scoring 23 points with 13 rebounds against the Raptors."Coming back from an illness that sapped him of a lot of energy, he showed a lot of moxie," coach Terry Stotts said.Wesley Matthews is averaging 23.5 points over the past four games, but he had just 11 at Atlanta in March.