NSL Playoff Reviews: 2/08/2021

 

Portland V San Antonio

 

Out West, Conference Finals style, the Portland Trailblazers continued on their merry way through the 2^nd round, sweeping aside the Dallas Mavericks in commanding style with only Game 2 coming down to the wire. This took them to 86-4 on the year. The Spurs are their opponents, and being the 2^nd seed in the West, we got the expected match up with these 2 giants after the Pelicans shocked them in Game 1, before the Butler switch up brought 4 straight wins and a conference final appearance. This series was a heavy weigh match up like no other.

 

Game 1 arrived and by now we all knew what to expect. The Spurs ran out their line up that got them through the Pelicans series, and the Blazers had to replace the injured Kawhi Leonard with Kent Bazemore at SF. They also shifted Harden to PG, directly into Butler. Line ups: Drummond/Noel/Holiday/Lillard/Butler V Howard/WCS/Bazemore/Westbrook/Harden.
The game was close to start, but was still leaning the way we all expected with the Blazers up 3 at � time. By the half, that was tied up. The 3^rd quarter as so often before went to the Blazers to be up 4 at � time but by the end, the Spurs shocked the NSL world taking the 4^th by 9 points and running away 5 point victors. The first loss for the Blazers with at least 2 of their big 3 healthy! The Spurs had 5 double figure scorers with Lillard dropping 33 and Butler 31 as the team racked up 16 steals to 8 and committed only 9 turnovers to 20, paired with an unbelievable 32/33 effort from the line compared to 13/16. All of that, and they still only won by 5 as the Blazers were still the Blazers shooting 55% from the field and 60% from deep in the game to still fall short. Harden had 45 and 10 assists and Westy had 30 and 11 but each committed 7 turnovers and they were rocked. 1-0 Spurs.

 

Game 2 and the Spurs kept on keeping on, rolling out the same line up of the previous 5 games. If it ain�t broke, right? The Blazers tried to adjust after the freak loss in Game 1 and benched Bazemore for Hart, swapping Westy back to PG and Harden to SG. Line ups: Drummond/Noel/Holiday/Lillard/Butler V Howard/WCS/Hart/Harden/Westbrook.
Weel game 1 may have looked like an aberration due to some massive play, but this one was every bit of a beat down by the Spurs to further shock the NSL world. The 1^st quarter went to script, 45 to 43 points dropped, Portland leading in Portland style but it collapsed in the 2^nd quarter to be down 22 at the half. The 3rd showed more of the same and the benches started to clear already as it was 39 by � time and finally a whopping 52 by the end. No starter played more than 30 minutes and Harden was held to only 22, Westbrook 18, as the Blazers shot 1/20 from deep and were out rebounded by 15, out assisted by 19 and committed 18 turnovers to 10 on the back of 8 steals to 17. Lillard had 36 points and 13 assists in 28 minutes with 3 steals as the Spurs shot 62% from the field and 45% from deep. All 5 starters hit double figures and 2 of the deep bench followed suit and this game looked like it could be telling. 2-0 for the Spurs.

 

Game 3 and the Spurs again hold strong as you would expect after a 52 point win. Why change now? The Blazers however went chaos line up to stem the bleeding and cut the rotation down to 7. They shifted Westrbook to the C spot and started WCS down at the 1, while also benching Hart for Bazemore once again. Line ups: Drummond/Noel/Holiday/Lillard/Butler V Westbrook/Howard/Bazemore/Harden/WCS.
The Spurs feeling good from last game came out strong in this one to take a 10 point lead into the � time break. The Blazers must have been tense at this point and the 2^nd quarter went stalemate so that the margin was still 10 at the half. In the 3^rd, the Blazers made some headway cutting it to 6 at � time and it�s now or never at this point. They finished strong though, taking the quarter by 13 and the game by 7 to stave off the deepest darkest hole. Westbrook at C posted 32/5/8 with 2 steals and 4 blocks while Howard commanded the middle with 18 and 22 rebounds. Harden dual paced the game with 43 and 10 assists, matched up with Lillard who also dropped 43 while Butler turned in 30 and the difference was the offensive rebounding to Portland 16-7 in this one. 2-1 to the Spurs.

 

Game 4 in Portland again, and we finally see the Spurs forced to make some changes to battle the Westbrook at C move. Robert Covington enters the starting line up at C, pushing Drummond down, and Butler moved to SG to try match up on Harden with Lillard going to PG. The Blazers nearly ran it back simply choosing to play Harden at PG and WCS at SG instead from their winning line up. Line ups: Covington/Drummond/Holiday/Butler/Lillard V Westbrook/Howard/Bazemore/Butler/Lillard.
This game will probably go down in NSL history with Portland taking a 2 point lead at � time, holding that at halftime, switching to down 3 at � time and finally coming up short by 4. It was a back and forth arm wrestle the entire way which was won by phenomenal performances by phenomenal stars. Westbrook posted 30 points, 15 rebounds, 7 assists. Harden posted 38 and 12 assists. Howard had a 22 and 12 night. Kanter had 18, 9 and 4 off the bench and the Blazers smashed the rebounds 55 to 34 but committed 16 turnovers to 9 and had 6/7 Free Throws compared to 28/29. In the end, it came down to one man who wanted it more. Lillard dropped 63 points shooting pretty much the same 3 pointers as the entire Blazers squad and flat out willed his team to the win. 3-1 to the Spurs.

 

Game 5 was always going to have a lot to live up to after that game 4, and at 3-1 and win or go home, it was tense. The Blazers ran back to the traditional starting Howard at C again but with Harden at PF and Westbrook heading back to PG in a 7 man rotation. The Spurs anticipated this but also moved to cover their bases by starting Noel at C in case Westy remained, but left the rest. Line ups: Noel/Drummond/Holiday/Butler/Lillard V Howard/Harden/Bazemore/WCS/Westbrook.
The line up that was tried and tested started to work for the Blazers, going up 6 at � time and then 8 by the half. This was the first time they�d been in this position in the series. It was back to 4 at � time but Lillard and the Spurs went nuts in the 4^th to win the quarter by 14, the game by 10 and head to the NSL Finals. Lillard was astounding. He dropped 68 points including 9 triples to lead 4 others in the teens for scoring and it was sheer will that got them over the line again, with the winning stat being 8 more triples and 4 less turnovers. 48 and 7 assists wasn�t enough from Harden and Westbrook flirted with a triple double with 27/7 and 10 as the season that will go down in the NSL history until the league dies was felled in the conference finals. 4-1 to the Spurs.

 

Congratulations to Nels and the Spurs for getting to the Finals by beating the team that many thought was unbeatable. Of course, injury is a massive factor here, but they were still 86-0 in games that had at least 2 of their stars healthy, leading into this series, so nothing can be taken away from this achievement. Lillard is the series MVP dropping 68 and 63 in consecutive games and averaging 49 points, 5 rebounds and 8 assists. Commiserations to the Blazers who were the pillar of the league all year as they were the year before. It will feel like a bitter end for sure, but this team is GREAT and will be back here again next year without a doubt.

Good luck San Antonio in the NSL Finals!

 

- NSL Insider News.