After getting swept in the season series vs the Oklahoma City Thunder, the Portland Trail Blazers held serve at the Moda Center and will look for a repeat performance in Game 2. The Blazers held the Thunder to 15.2 percent from behind the arc in Game 1 and got 54 points from their star backcourt of Damian Lillard and CJ McCollum.
The Blazers should expect a huge bounce-back performance from the Thunder, which is why oddsmakers have installed Portland as a 1.5-point favorite with a total of 222.
Thunder vs Blazers Game Center
STANDOUT STATS
- The Blazers were scoring at will coming into the postseason and continued that play in Game 1. Over their final 10 games of the regular season, they were averaging 118.7 points per game while taking the fifth-most shot attempts. In Game 1, they shot 41 percent from the field and an excellent 44 percent from behind the arc.
- Although the Blazers are short-handed in the paint with Jusuf Nurkic out due to a leg injury, they’ve weathered the storm and concentrated their efforts in stopping opponents’ deep shots. As a result, they were third in the NBA over the last 10 games by limiting opponents to 32.3 percent from behind the arc and in Game 1 held the Thunder to 5-for-33 from three-point range (15.2 percent).
- The Thunder swept the four-game season series vs the Blazers while covering the spread in each contest. In those games, Paul George averaged 38 points and 45 percent from behind the arc but he seems to be struggling with a shoulder injury that has hampered him over the final quarter of the regular season. George’s three-point shooting after the all-star break dropped to 33.6 percent from 40.6 percent and he missed 11 of his 15 attempts from three-point range in Game 1.
- The Thunder won five straight games to wrap up the regular season and they did that by scoring a ton of points. In that stretch, the Thunder averaged 122.6 points per game with a +9.4 point differential. They did that by leading the league in shot attempts with a whopping 98 attempts from the field per game while also averaging 40.4 attempts from behind the arc. They still managed to shoot 93 times in Game 1 but their overall field-goal percentage of 39.8 percent was a key reason why they came up short.
- The UNDER was the smart play in Game 1 and when these teams meet, the UNDER has been the profitable endeavor. The UNDER has hit in five of the last seven games in this matchup but the Blazers’ scoring has made them a hot OVER bet. The OVER has hit in 14 of the Blazers’ last 17 games at home, and 23 of their 41 home games saw the total get smashed.
My Best Bet for Thunder vs Blazers
Thunder Moneyline
I’m not willing to bend the knee and acknowledge the Blazers as superior to the Thunder ... yet. OKC shot so poorly from behind the arc in Game 1 that it put the Thunder in a hole all game and even with the poor shooting, it took a last-minute three from Damian Lillard to seal the deal.
I expect the Thunder to push the pace and use their advantage down low with Steven Adams, who was feasting on Enes Kanter in the paint for most of the game. In fact, the Thunder still showed they could dominate around the basket by outscoring the Blazers 54-42 in the paint.
