The only thing the Portland Trail Blazers could do following Friday night’s 141-99 loss at home to the Utah Jazz was talk about it and then work through the problems that led to the disappointing performance.
On Saturday, the team held a meeting to discuss what went wrong and then practiced. Afterward, coach Chauncey Billups left feeling positive about the progress made.
“As bad as last night was, today was a good day,” Blazers coach Chauncey Billups said.
Following the loss, Billups said his team lost some of its juice after learning that Utah forward Lauri Markkanen was out.
Then, when the Blazers fell behind early, they lacked the ability and maturity to recover. He blamed that on his team’s overall inexperience.
“We’re ao fragile mentally, a lot of times,” Billups said. “We’ve got to just get better there and know that when there’s a couple of things going on in-house, you still can get through them. You still can handle it. But we’re just so fragile, mature-wise, that you have the lowest of the lows. But that’s not really where we are though, which is positive.”
Where the Blazers are is not complicated. They entered the season knowing they lacked in too many areas (shooting, turnovers, defense and rebounding) to contend for a postseason berth. The goal has been to play hard, develop and be competitive. However, young teams deficient in so many areas are bound to get blown out on occasion.
Earlier this season, the Blazers were thumped 140-106 by Golden State (13-9) and 134-89 by Memphis (15-8).
But those defeats made more sense than Friday night’s against the Jazz (5-17). Without Markkanen, the Jazz shot 55.2% from the field, 43.8% from three-point range and produced 76 points in the paint.
Blazers guard Anfernee Simons said motivated teams without their best players can present problems.,
“That’s the most dangerous game to me,” he said. “It’s easy to get up for a game when you know their best player is playing, and it’s gonna be a competitive match. And you look forward to the matchup. Then, when those guys go out, it’s kind of a letdown, in a way. And you kind of take it for granted.”
Simply put, the Blazers can’t afford to be so careless.
“If we want to be a great team, it shouldn’t matter who was out there, and we should be able to play the same way each and every night,” he said.
Billups said his young team has to learn some tough lessons the hard way.
“The only way you get through it is to go through it,” Billups said.
-- Aaron Fentress | afentress@Oregonian.com | @AaronJFentress (Twitter), @AaronJFentress (Instagram), @AaronFentress (Facebook)