On April 15, the first game of the series between the Trail Blazers, ranked third in the Western Conference, and the Pelicans began.
The Trail Blazers have performed well this season, ranking third in the Western Conference. They seem to be the team with the advantage, but in fact they are not.
Starting lineups for both sides:
Pelicans: Jrue Holiday, Anthony Davis, Nikola Mirotic, Raja Rondo, Intowan Moore.
The Pelicans had been taking the initiative in the first three quarters. After three quarters, the score became 63:75, with the Pelicans leading by 12 points.
In the final quarter, the Trail Blazers relied on a 7-2 spurt to chase the score to 70-77.
Rondo's layup helped the Pelicans stabilize their morale. Big Eyebrow followed up with a 2+1, and Holiday also made a wonderful high-throw goal. After a 9-2 offensive climax, the Pelicans rewritten the score to 86
-72.
At the critical moment, McCollum and Nurcic played 2+1 one after another, and Lillard also performed. At 3 minutes and 32 seconds, McCollum hit another three-pointer from the outside. After a wave of 13-2 offensive, the Trail Blazers scored
Chase to 85-88.
With 2 minutes and 29 seconds left in the game, Clark's three-pointer helped the Pelicans break the deadlock. Rondo followed with 2 points, and the Pelicans maintained a 6-point advantage.
With 1 minute and 34 seconds left in the game, Turner took off the offensive rebound and made a layup. Then Lillard passed the ball to McCollum in the corner, who hit a three-pointer, and the Trail Blazers chased the score to 92-93.
.
After the timeout, both sides made mistakes. With 15.3 seconds left in the game, Lillard failed to make a layup, and Thick Eyebrow picked off the rebound. The Trail Blazers immediately adopted foul tactics, and Thick Eyebrow made 2 free throws. The Pelicans regained a 3-point advantage, leaving only
Trail Blazers 12.4 seconds.
With 6.3 seconds left in the game, Holiday slapped Connaughton for a layup, and then Davis made 2 free throws to completely seal the victory.
In the end, the Pelicans defeated the Trail Blazers 97-95, and the series score became 1:0.
The specific scores in the fourth quarter are (Pelicans in front): 21-18, 24-18, 30-27, 22-32.
Pelicans: Jrue Holiday 21 points and 7 rebounds, Anthony Davis 35 points and 14 rebounds, Nikola Mirotic 16 points and 11 rebounds, Raja Rondo 6 points, 8 rebounds and 17 assists, Clark 10
point.
Trail Blazers: Damian Lillard scored 18 points, 7 rebounds and 7 assists on 6-of-23 shooting, CJ McCollum scored 19 points on 7-of-18 shooting, Jusuf Nurcic had 11 points and 11 rebounds.
Evan Turner had 13 points and 7 rebounds, and Ed Davis had 6 points and 13 rebounds.
…
On April 18, the New Orleans Pelicans challenged the Portland Trail Blazers away.
After the whole game, the Pelicans defeated the Trail Blazers 111-102, leading the total score 2-0.
Specific scores: 25-23, 29-36, 33-19, 24-24 (Pelicans in front).
Holiday continued his hot touch in this campaign. He made 14 of 24 shots and scored 33 points and 9 assists, becoming the Pelicans' number one contributor to the win.
For the Pelicans, in addition to Holiday, Mirotic had 17 points, 8 rebounds and 2 blocks, Anthony Davis had 22 points, 13 rebounds, 1 assist, 2 steals and 2 blocks, Moore had 8 points, 5 rebounds and 2 assists, and Rondo had 16 points and 10 blocks.
Rebounds and 9 assists, Darius Miller had 8 points and 1 rebound, Solomon Hill had 4 points, 1 rebound, 1 assist and 1 steal, and Clark had 3 points, 3 assists and 1 rebound.
For the Trail Blazers, Aminu had 14 points, 15 rebounds and 1 assist, Turner had 0 points, 4 rebounds, 5 assists and 2 steals, Nurkic had 13 points, 3 rebounds, 1 steal and 1 block, McCollum had 22 points, 3 rebounds, 6 assists and 1 steal.
Stealing 1 block, Ed Davis had 4 points and 6 rebounds, Harkless had 11 points and 5 rebounds, Zach Collins had 12 points and 5 rebounds, and Connaughton had 9 points, 4 assists and 1 block.
Trail Blazers star Lillard was in poor form. He made 7 of 18 shots, scored 17 points, 3 rebounds and 4 assists, and committed as many as 7 turnovers.
…
On April 20, the third game between the Trail Blazers and the Pelicans started at the Pelicans' home court.
In the end, the Pelicans defeated the Trail Blazers 119-102, leading the Trail Blazers 3-0 in the series and winning the match point.
The specific scores in the fourth quarter are (Trail Blazers in front): 20-36, 25-28, 25-27, 32-28.
Trail Blazers: CJ McCollum 22 points, Damian Lillard 20 points and 8 turnovers, Al-Farouq Aminu 21 points and 8 rebounds.
Pelicans: Jrue Holiday had 16 points and 7 assists, Anthony Davis had 28 points and 11 rebounds, Nikola Mirotic had 30 points and 8 rebounds, and Raja Rondo had 16 points and 11 assists.
…
On April 22, the Pelicans at home defeated the Trail Blazers 131-123 after four quarters. In this way, the Pelicans swept the Trail Blazers 4-0 with a total score and advanced to the second round of the playoffs.
The 131 points set a new record for points scored in a single playoff game in the history of the Pelicans, and the 42 points in the third quarter were also the record for points scored in a single quarter in the history of the Pelicans in the playoffs!
The specific scores in the fourth quarter were 25-26, 31-32, 31-42 and 36-31 (the Trail Blazers were in front).
For the Trail Blazers, McCollum had 38 points and 3 assists, Aminu had 27 points, 6 rebounds and 2 steals, Lillard had 19 points, 6 assists and 5 rebounds on 7 of 16 shots, Nurkic had 18 points, 11 rebounds, 3 steals and 2 blocks.
, Turner had 15 points and 5 assists, and the Trail Blazers only scored 6 points off the bench.
For the Pelicans, Big Eyebrow had 47 points (a career high in the playoffs), 11 rebounds and 3 blocks, Holiday had 41 points, 8 assists and 3 rebounds, Moore had 14 points, 3 rebounds and 3 steals, and Mirotic had 10 points, 11 rebounds and 3 blocks.
Rondo had 7 points, 7 rebounds and 16 assists.
Overall, this was a surprising and unsuspicious series.
What is surprising is that the Trail Blazers seem to be very strong and ranked high, but they lost the series and were swept out. This is really unexpected.
What is not suspenseful is the course of the series. It is obvious that the Trail Blazers have no chance of winning in front of the Pelicans. Their backcourt is tightly controlled by Holiday and Rondo, and the substitutes are not strong. They can only watch helplessly.
Seeing the team losing, they had nothing to do.
This series can completely prove that they are both double guns in the backcourt. Lillard and CJ McCollum of the Trail Blazers are more than one level worse than Curry and Clay of the Warriors!
The regular season looks similar, with two guns in the backcourt, but in the playoffs, as the intensity increases, the Blazers' double guns in the backcourt are revealed!
Clay is much easier to use than McCollum, and Curry is much better than Lillard!
In the competitive arena, victory or defeat is the best measure!
