DETROIT -- The Portland Trail Blazers wrapped up their 2018-19 Eastern Conference schedule with a 99-90 loss to the Detroit Pistons Saturday night at Little Caesars Arena in the third game of a four-game trip.
"That was a rough game," said Trail Blazers head coach Terry Stotts. "The first quarter was brutal, neither team really had it going. We had a lot of opportunities, I felt, in the first quarter to have a bigger lead than we did that we weren't able to take advantage of. After that, we just struggled offensively, didn't have a lot of rhythm."
The Trail Blazers are now 48-28 overall and 19-19 on the road and 24-6 versus Eastern Conference teams. The loss ends a six-game winning streak for Portland, though they've won eight of their last 10.
However, Portland now falls to fourth in the Western Conference standings, half game behind the Rockets for third and 3.5 games behind the Warriors and Nuggets for first.
Both teams turned in likely their worst performance in the first half of Saturday's game, with the Trail Blazers shooting just 26 percent from the field to 14 percent for the Pistons, who started the game by missing their first 13 shots.
With both teams struggling, all it took was one player, in this case, Enes Kanter, playing decent to give Portland an advantage. With the 6-11 center, who has assumed the starting role in place of Jusuf Nurkic, scoring 14 points on 7-of-12 shooting, the Trail Blazers were able to build a 12-point lead before going into the half leading 34-31.
"I thought Enes did an outstanding job of doing a lot of dirty work and keeping us in it," said Stotts. "Give Detroit credit, they were really aggressive defensively. They showed a crowd in the paint."
But whether it was playing the night before, playing without two starters finally catching up to them or both, the Trail Blazers were unable to hold the Piston down in the second half, even with Blake Griffin being a late scratch due to a sore left knee.
“It’s just another game, no matter who’s out there," said Moe Harkless. "They’re NBA players, they play and they’re capable of playing well any night. So, we prepared for (Griffin) to play, he didn’t play. That’s one of their better players. That was probably good for us, but unfortunately, we still weren’t able to come out with the win.” But Reggie Jackson and Andre Drummond did play. The point guard/center were the main reason the Pistons took their first lead of the game with 4:43 to play in the third quarter and never relinquished it again.
"It was a junked up game, physical," said Damian Lillard. "For most of the game neither team could make a shot. They started to make shots, they got some energy but it was still a close game. We didn't shoot the ball well but I thought defensively, we were pretty good. They started to make some shots. We just lost."
The Blazers were led by Kanter, who went 9-of-17 from the field for 20 points, 15 rebounds and two steals in 34 minutes. Lillard went 8-of-25 from the field and 3-of-8 from three for 23 points to go with eight rebounds, three assists, a block and a steal in 36 minutes.
"With a lot of misses, that means the game is just going back and forth," said Lillard. "You get a little bit tired and it's physical. But when you're not making shots, you've got to be able to get stops, you got to be able to try to get to the line and we wasn't able to do that at all tonight."
Moe Harkless added a double-double as well with 10 points and 10 rebounds to go with three blocks, two assists and a steal in 26 minutes. Jake Layman also added 10 points while Seth Curry came off the bench to round out Portland's double-digit scorers.
The Pistons were led by Jackson, who scored 19 of his 28 points in the second half while also tallying five rebounds and five assists in 34 minutes. Drummond put up 22 points and 19 rebounds for the double-double and also added four assists, four steals and three blocks in 38 minutes.
Langston Galloway added 12 points off the bench as Detroits third and final double-digit scorer.
Next up, the Trail Blazers wrap up a four-game trip in Minneapolis against the Timberwolves at the Target Center.
"I thought tonight, they kind of sped us up a bit, took us out of what we've been doing the last four, five games," said Lillard. "We've just got to keep trusting, keep the ball moving, hard cuts, doing the same things we've been doing on offense."
Tipoff is scheduled for Monday at 5 p.m.