An ugly victory, but no answers

By Jason Quick of The Oregonian staff 


It depends on who's talking to figure out what is really going on 
with the suddenly unpredictable Trail Blazers. 

Coach Mike Dunleavy says the Blazers are not playing well enough 
to make it out of the first round of the playoffs. His players, on 
the other hand, do not seem concerned, saying everything is being 
blown out of proportion. 

Regardless of whose words reach the ears of the NBA, this much is 
true: The Blazers nearly lost to the worst team in the league on 
Tuesday, coming back (yes, coming back) to beat the Chicago Bulls 
92-81 before a crowd of 19,980 at the Rose Garden. 

And this comes after a week that included a home loss to 
Sacramento, a stink bomb in Cleveland and a no-show in Minneapolis. 

"We've got to do a much better job from this time forward, 
improving as a team, or we will get knocked out in the first round 
in the Western Conference," Dunleavy said. "We've got to take all 
levels of our game up a couple notches from where we're playing. 
From decision making, to being unselfish with the basketball, to 
doing a better job defensively." 

Let's pause to let the steam drift away. . . . 

Okay. 

Indeed, it was a puzzling scene, hearing the Rose Garden crowd 
erupt in applause for a 59-57 lead at the end of the third quarter 
over a Chicago team that entered with just six wins. 

But that was how bad things were going for the Blazers (33-14). 
They missed nine consecutive shots early in the third quarter, 
helping Chicago take a 57-49 lead with 3:16 left. The string of 
missed shots could have been worse, but the 10th shot -- a dunk 
attempt by Stacey Augmon -- bounced high off the rim, hit the 
backboard and went in. 

That stopped the bleeding and bought the Blazers enough time to 
patch together a 10-0 run to end the quarter and draw the response 
from the crowd. 

Nobody could breath a sigh of relief until Arvydas Sabonis scored 
four consecutive points to put Portland up 86-74 with 3:07 left in 
the game. Until then, there were images of "SportsCenter" being 
led with Chicago ending its 11-game losing streak. 

"I thought Chicago played harder than we did and for most of the 
game, they played better than we did," Dunleavy said. "I thought 
some of our turnovers were inexcusable. I thought our team effort 
and our total of getting up and down the floor wasn't very good. 
And our carelessness with the basketball really put us in a hole." 

The only way the Blazers came out of this one feeling good is 
knowing that Sabonis is back after missing three games and that 
Rasheed Wallace's illness on Monday is nothing serious. 

Sabonis, who sat out the last three games with back spasms, came 
off the bench and scored a season-high 23 points in 23 minutes. He 
hit 8 of 10 shots and had 16 points in the pivotal fourth quarter. 

Wallace, meanwhile, had 14 points and seven rebounds a day after 
he left practice early because he was feeling ill. Maybe Tuesday's 
news that he was named to his second consecutive All-Star team 
perked him up. 

But other than that, the question swirling around at the Rose 
Garden was: What is wrong with the Blazers? 

The players, meanwhile, are in no mood to hear rumblings about the 
age of this team, or the health, or the sporadic play. The 
consensus was that teams go through stretches during a long season 
when they don't play up to par. 

"Who's happy after games like this?" Sabonis said. "Normally, I 
think we need to be maybe 20 points up going into the fourth 
quarter and be able to rest some people and play other guys. We 
need to concentrate against teams like this. When we don't, we 
always have trouble." 

Guard Greg Anthony, a 10-year veteran, said during the 82-game 
season, a good team will play well maybe 30 times. The other 52 
games are a toss-up. 

"The great teams are able to win games when they don't play well," 
Anthony said. "Yeah, we're not playing as well as we would like, 
but the season ebbs and flows. The question is how long it lasts." 

The Blazers cannot afford for this so-so play to last any longer. 
Portland has just two more games against the weaker Eastern 
Conference teams -- against which its record is a franchise-best 
23-5 -- meaning a Western Conference-loaded schedule awaits, which 
puts added importance on every game. 

But the Blazers -- Dunleavy not included -- don't seemed concerned 
with their mini-funk. 

"I'm not concerned," guard Steve Smith said. "I'd rather struggle 
and win than struggle and lose. We didn't have a good game in 
Minnesota and we didn't play well in Cleveland, but you are going 
to have those kind of games. But to come back here and just win 
. . . we definitely think we could have a better record, but we 
are happy where we are at." 

Added point guard Damon Stoudamire, who had six of his seven 
assists in the first half: "Everybody is putting too much into 
this. Now that Scottie (Pippen) is out, everybody wants to nit-
pick."