“Oh no he didn’t, Greg Brown!” Yes, he really did.
The Trail Blazers dropped their final Summer League contest, 95-92, but all anyone was talking about following the exhibition is the throwdown by Portland’s rookie forward.
Toward the end of the first half, Brown III took a pass from CJ Elleby, went between his legs and dunked on the fastbreak as if it were the NBA Slam Dunk Contest. Except, it was during the game.
“That was crazy,” Antonio Blakeney told ESPN’s broadcast. “Nobody’s ever did that on my team before. That was the craziest thing I’ve ever seen.”
Greg Brown III finished with 13 points on 6-for-7 shooting and eight rebounds. But as for the dunk, well I guess we better get used to seeing that type of thing.
“To be honest, that’s normal for me,” Brown III told ESPN. “That’s what I’ve been doing that since high school, just going through traffic, trying to pull off the craziest dunks I can pull off in my mind. So at that time, I was like ‘man I should just try and go between my legs,’ and it happened.”
As for the game, the Trail Blazers led by as many as 14 in the opening period and didn't relinquish that lead until the final minute. But Armoni Brooks (30 points, nine 3-pointers) and the Rockets pushed their way ahead to improve to 3-2 on their Summer League season.
Antonio Blakeney led the Trail Blazers with 23 points to go with seven rebounds, Michael Beasley netted 16, Emmanuel Mudiay totaled 14 points, eight assists and seven rebounds, and Elleby added 13 points and 10 rebounds. Elleby, the only player from Portland’s regular roster last season, reflected on his approach to the summer league session after the game.
“Just to play hard and not think about too much,” he said. “I think I can get caught up, my first few games playing like this in a while, and so just go out there and have fun and leave it out there.”
The game concluded Portland’s time in Las Vegas, and the team will head home after going 2-3. Summer league, though, is much more about player and team development, and that was the focus for Summer League head coach/regular season assistant coach Roy Rogers.
“If you look at where we started, two weeks ago, basically guys were just getting to know each other, and how far we’ve come,” he said postgame. “I’m very pleased with our effort and how we progressed from Day 1 to where we are today. Obviously, we wanted to have a better record, but sometimes you can’t measure progress with your record. I thought we got better with every game.”