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Key: Battling the Blazers
Regardless of the Wine & Gold’s record coming in, the Moda Center – (formerly the Rose Garden) – in Portland has always been a difficult place to play.
The Cavaliers are now halfway through their six-game, 11-day trip, with a back-to-back against the Jazz and Nuggets remaining after Wednesday night’s showdown in the Pacific Northwest.
The Cavs are coming off an excellent team win over the Lakers on Sunday night, taking a double-digit lead in the first quarter and barely looking back the rest of the way, with all five starters netting at least 17 points as Cleveland halted a 12-game losing streak and topped the Lakers in L.A. for the fifth time in the last six meetings.
After winning six of seven, the Blazers have dropped their last two contests, including a road loss to the upstart Kings on Monday night despite a 35-point outburst by Damian Lillard.
Even as a team that reached the NBA Finals in four straight years, the Cavaliers have struggled recently in Portland – having dropped their last five in this arena by an average of 16.8 points per. But tonight, they come to town off a win and two days’ rest, facing a Blazers team that might be ebbing at just the right time.
Key: The Dame Game
Taking on the Blazers means taking on their elite backcourt which means taking on Damian Lillard, one of the most consistently outstanding stars in the NBA.
Lillard’s numbers haven’t changed much since his arrival in the NBA seven years ago – and that’s a good thing. He’s currently the Blazers top scorer and assist man, currently sits seventh in the Conference in scoring and is lined up for this fourth All-Star appearance in February.
This season, the former Weber State standout has tallied 20 or more points on 19 occasions, 30 or more nine times and already has five 40-point showings.
In 11 career contests against the Wine & Gold, Lillard is averaging 25.8 points per – posting a pair of 30-point efforts and going off for 40 and 11 assists in a loss at The Q two seasons ago.
Cleveland will likely try to counter Lillard with its jack-of-all-trades, Alec Burks, who’s been rock-solid since joining the Cavs in late November.
In Sunday night’s win over the Lakers, the eighth-year man from Colorado notched his first double-double as a Cavalier, finishing with 17 points, 13 boards, four assists and a steal.
Over his last nine games, dating back to December 28, Burks is averaging 14.9 points, 5.2 boards and 3.1 assists per, scoring at least 17 points in six of those contests.
Key: Mess with the Bull
Only the Mavericks’ Luka Doncic has tallied more double-figure scoring performances as a rookie than Collin Sexton, who’s done so in 37 contests so far this season.
The only Cavalier to appear in all 44 games this year, Sexton seems like he’s fought through the rookie wall over the past couple weeks and is coming off a strong showing in Sunday’s win over L.A. – finishing with 17 points on 7-of-14 shooting, adding three boards, three dimes and a steal.
Sexton – who tops his rookie class with an .872 mark from the stripe – went 2-of-4 from the stripe on Sunday night, just the second time this season he’s missed more than one free throw in a game this year.
The Young Bull will have to be sharp on both ends of the floor on Wednesday night – taking on the other half of Portland’s stellar backcourt, C.J. McCollum.
Like Lillard, McCollum is also in the Conference’s top 20 in scoring, averaging 20.7 ppg in his sixth season with the Blazers – his fourth straight season averaging better than 20 points. And like Lillard, the Canton native has had some big individual performances – with 14 20-point games, five 30-point outings and a pair of 40-point games.
He’s also been tough on the Wine & Gold over the past couple years, averaging an even 25.0 points per over the last three meetings.
Key: Blue-Collar Big
Tristan Thompson had been putting up good numbers upon his return from the foot injury that sidelined him for 10 games, but he finally looked like his old self on Sunday night at STAPLES Center – notching his 18th double-double of the season, finishing with 15 points and a game-high 14 boards to go with a pair of blocks in the win.
Those two swats tied him with Anderson Varejao and Brad Daugherty for seventh place on the franchise’s all-time list.
Thompson’s 11.7 ppg average is the highest scoring mark since his third season and his 11.2 rpg are a career-high and good for sixth-best in the East.
Like many of his teammates, Tristan has had a difficult time against the Blazers over the years. Over his last six meetings with Portland, he’s averaging 5.2 points and 8.2 boards per.
The Blazers have three players averaging double-figure scoring this year: their two guards and Jusuf Nurkic – who’d been on a major roll before putting up a six-point clunker in Portland’s recent loss to the Kings.
Before that, the Bosnian big man was averaging 19.4 points and 11.0 boards over his previous 10 outings.
Nurkic was excellent against the Cavs in Portland’s last visit to The Q, finishing with 23 points on 10-of-12 shooting, but struggled with just seven points on 3-for-9 shooting in the Blazers’ win here one year ago.
Key: Second in Command
Sunday night’s win over the Lakers was a bit of an anomaly. All season long, the Cavaliers bench had done much of the squad’s heavy lifting.
But in that victory at STAPLES Center, it was the Wine & Gold’s starting unit that led the way. After averaging 67.0 points per as a unit through the first two games of the six-game junket, the Cavaliers second unit took a break – combining for just 14 points in the win.
Jordan Clarkson, still Cleveland’s leading scorer with a 17.0 ppg mark, finished with nine points – just his fifth game this season under double-figures. Clarkson has also topped the 20-point plateau on 14 occasions so far this season. (No Cavalier – starter or reserve – has topped the 30-point mark yet.)
Ante Zizic went scoreless on Sunday after leading Cleveland with 18 points in the previous contest while Matthew Dellavedova had a quiet three-point night in 16 minutes of work.
After notching double-figures in his first two contests with Cleveland, Cameron Payne slowed down a bit over his next two – including a scoreless outing in limited minutes against L.A.
The Blazers' two top bench scorers are Zach Collins and former Buckeye Evan Turner, who’s tallied double-figures in five of his last six outings, including a 14-point effort in Monday night’s loss to the Kings.