MILWAUKEE — The Trail Blazers were within a few seconds of coming away with their second consecutive road win Monday night in Milwaukee before a jump ball call started a sequence of unfortunate events that led to Portland losing 90-88 to the Bucks at BMO Harris Bradley Center.
“It was a good comeback and a good effort on the road,” said Trail Blazers head coach Terry Stotts. “It hurts to lose a game like this, but at the same time on the road and when you’re struggling offensively to stay in the game, that’s a positive, but it still stings to lose one.”
With the loss, the Trail Blazers are now 9-13 overall on the season, 4-8 away from the Moda Center and 1-3 versus teams from the Eastern Conference.
If you’ve been paying attention to the Trail Blazers over the last few weeks, Monday night’s game probably felt a bit familiar. Portland went down by double-digits in the first quarter, a common occurrence as of late, before playing their best basketball of the night in the third quarter, another hallmark of their performances over the last week or so, to take a lead, in this case, at 62-60, going into the fourth quarter.
“We were shooting under 40 percent all night and to be able to come back against a good defensive team, that’s encouraging,” said Stotts. “Our team keeps competing. We’ve been down before, we come back. It’s mixed emotions, games like these, because we do play hard.”
That could be said for both teams in a fourth quarter that featured seven lead changes and four ties. After nearly 12 minutes of battling back and forth, two Damian Lillard free throws put Portland up 88-84 with 22 seconds to play.
But on the ensuing possession, Bucks shooting guard OJ Mayo would hit a three-pointer with less than four seconds running off the clock to cut the lead to 88-87. The Trail Blazers had to call one timeout to advance the ball after being unable to inbound the ball before a five-second call and on the next inbounds attempt, Michael Carter-Williams tied up CJ McCollum for a jump ball, which Carter-Williams won, giving the Bucks the chance for a go-ahead score.
“We ran one of our late-game inbounds plays, I broke towards the ball and caught it, turned and they called a jump ball,” said McCollum. “If the referee doesn’t make a call, you’ve got to respect it and move on. I felt like it was a pretty quick jump ball, but who am I (to judge)?”
The Bucks got the ball to Greg Monroe, who’s layup with 5.9 seconds to play gave Milwaukee a one-point lead. Portland had a chance to tie or win the game, but Meyers Leonard’s floater was blocked by John Henson with 2.9 seconds to play to effectively end the game.
“It’s tough, we had that game,” said McCollum. “All we had to do was get a stop or get the ball and make free throws. I hurt us on that possession getting a jumpball. We didn’t get a stop and there was a blocked shot at the end. That’s the way it goes but we have to get stops down the stretch because we know we have good free throw shooters, we can make free throws. It’s just about securing the ball and finishing the game.”
While Monday night’s game played out in a somewhat familiar fashion as other tough-luck losses the Trail Blazers have endured this season, at least one player thought the loss to the Bucks had a different feel.
“It was one of the foul, one possession games,” said Lillard. “Just one of those games down the stretch with under a minute where they fouled and depended on making shots. We made free throws and I thought we defended really well but they hit a couple tough shots, contested shots. We just had an unfortunate situation, getting tied up, and they took advantage of it. We had the opportunity to have the last possession and we just weren’t able to pull it out.”
Lillard finished with 23 points, seven assists and five rebounds in 38 minutes. With his fifth assist Monday night, Lillard passed Sydney Wicks for 10th all-time in franchise history in assists. CJ McCollum went 5-of-21 from the field and 2-of-11 from three to finish with 17 points, a career-high five steals, four assists and two rebounds in 36 minutes.
Allen Crabbe, who is becoming one of Portland’s most reliable performers in his third season out of Cal, went 4-of-9 from the field to finish with 12 points, three rebounds, two steals and an assist in 28 minutes off the bench. Ed Davis made important plays on both ends of the floor late before finishing with a double-double of 10 points, 13 rebounds, two blocks and two assists.
All five of Milwaukee’s starters scored in double figures led by Giannis Antetokounmpo, who went for 17 points on 50 percent shooting, nine rebounds and two blocks. Monroe finished with 16 points, 12 rebounds and Mayo added 15, all of which came in the second half.
Next up, the Trail Blazers head to Cleveland for the second night of a back-to-back versus the Cavs at Quicken Loans Arena. Tipoff is scheduled for 4 pm.
