Portland Trail Blazers: 3 takeaways from Game 1 vs. Thunder

2. The Blazers were undaunted by the moment

Game 1 was important for the Portland Trail Blazers on multiple levels. For one, it’s a home game, and a loss would relinquish home-court advantage. Deeper than that, the Blazers entered the series losers of 10 straight playoff games. They were also swept by the Thunder in this year’s season series. Yet with all of that standing against them, this Portland squad delivered.

The big first quarter was a promising start, showing that the Blazers understood the gravity of the challenge. It’s not surprising that OKC, the NBA’s fourth-best defense, managed to close the gap over the course of the game. Still, the team held fairly steady, maintaining its lead from 10:08 in the first quarter through the final buzzer.

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Enes Kanter was the X-factor for Portland. Filling in for the injured Jusuf Nurkic, it was hard to tell how he would do in his first playoff game in two years. The result was a performance that has only been matched in franchise history by Bill Walton and LaMarcus Aldridge.  The team also came up big on the defensive end. Aminu and Harkless were aggressive on the ball and blocked three shots each.

Even with the pressures of past playoff failures, the Portland Trail Blazers delivered in Game 1 of the series. The key for them is to try repeating this three more times in order to advance to the next series.