After years of struggling against teams with winning records, the Portland Trail Blazers are finally coming out on top against the NBA’s top teams.
As the Portland Trail Blazers return home to face the Oklahoma City Thunder tonight, they find themselves in unfamiliar territory. They’re currently 12-10 against teams with records of .500 or better on the season, and have won six of their last seven games when facing teams with winning records.
The Blazers have historically underwhelmed against teams with winning records during the Damian Lillard era, and it has come back to bite them in the playoffs year after year.
In the 2015-16 season, Rip City finished as the fifth seed in the Western Conference, but were 18-28 against teams with records of .500 or better.
They’d go on to steal a series against a Los Angeles Clippers team that was without Blake Griffin and Chris Paul in Games 5 and 6, but in the second round, the Blazers were dealt a gentlemen’s sweep by a Golden State Warriors team that was without Stephen Curry for the majority of the series.
In the 2016-17 season, the Blazers snuck into the playoffs as an 8-seed and struggled mightily against the league’s more competitive teams, finishing the regular season with a record of 17-26 against teams with records of .500 or better.
When the first round of the playoffs came around, Portland lost to the Warriors in four quick games.
This was a Golden State team that would go on to only lose one game for the entirety of the playoffs on its way to an NBA title, so there was no shame in getting swept by a team that was dominating literally every other team it faced.
However, there was most certainly shame in the Blazers losing those four games to the Warriors by an average margin of 18.5 points. It’s one thing to be outplayed by a superior team, it’s another thing to not even belong on the same court as them.
Last year, the Trail Blazers were only two games below .500 against teams with records of .500 or better, but they had the fortune of facing many of those teams while they were suffering key injuries. The Minnesota Timberwolves without Jimmy Butler, the Washington Wizards without John Wall, the Miami Heat without Hassan Whiteside and the New Orleans Pelicans without Rajon Rondo, just to name a few.
When playoff time came around and they had to face a Pelicans team with Rajon Rondo, they were completely outclassed, getting swept in four games with the average margin of victory being 9.0 points.
The Portland Trail Blazers’ next two games will be a great barometer on whether they can continue to hold their own against the league’s best teams.
The first matchup is against an Oklahoma City Thunder franchise that the Blazers have made light work of in the post-Kevin Durant era, winning seven of their last eight meetings with OKC.
Friday night, however, the Blazers are facing a very different Thunder team.
This Oklahoma City team is cohesive, suffocating on defense, has more depth than ever before and is more dynamic on offense after handing over the primary scoring responsibilities to MVP candidate Paul George. The Thunder have won seven of their last 10 games and are in prime position to challenge for the No. 1 seed in the West.
Next, after catching some shuteye, the Portland Trail Blazers will wake up Saturday morning faced with the challenge of slowing down the most unstoppable force in the NBA today: James Harden.
On the heels of hitting a game-winning 3 in Golden State Thursday night, James Harden has now scored 40 points in five straight games and has had at least 35 points in nine straight games, with the Rockets winning 11 of their last 12.
Good teams find themselves on the business end of defeat every day in the NBA, so losing either of these games won’t necessarily be a death knell for Rip city, especially after playing so well against plus .500 teams in recent weeks.
But handling their business at home against these two red-hot teams would bode well for the Blazers’ prospects of competing in the playoffs going forward. We’ll see if they can keep up their winning ways against winning teams starting Friday.