After duelling with Kyrie Irving, once again, Damian Lillard stepped up and coldly stuck a dagger in a team’s heart with time running out. Sorry, Cleveland, it was just your turn. Per the Oregonian: “Cold blooded,’ Cleveland’s Dion Waiters said of the game-winner. ‘Incredible,’ Joel Freeland said of the dominant individual performance. ‘He’s like a silent assassin on the court,’ Earl Watson said of Lillard. ‘He’s deadly when he shoots the ball.’ Lillard was certainly a last-second marksman for the Blazers on Tuesday, calmly and confidently nailing a 30-foot step-back three with 0.4 seconds left to lift them to a 119-116 victory over the Cavaliers before 15,689 at Quicken Loans Arena. It was the second consecutive game-winner for Lillard — who hit a fadeaway jumper to beat the Detroit Pistons Sunday — and provided another remarkable moment in a season that continues to amaze. ‘It’s crazy that we’re pulling off wins like this,’ Freeland said of the Blazers, who possess the NBA’s best record at 22-4. At the very least, it was a crazy outing for Lillard. Going head-to-head against another of the NBA’s marquee young point guards, Kyrie Irving, Lillard played one of the best games of his career, finishing with 36 points, 10 assists, eight rebounds and one blocked shot. He made 11 of 23 shots, including 8 of 12 three-pointers, and flirted with or set multiple career highs. Lillard made the most threes of his career, tied his career-high in rebounds and registered the third-highest scoring output of his career. All the while, he became the first player to finish with at least 36 points, 10 assists, eight rebounds and eight three-pointers since Jason Kidd did so on April 11, 1995. There were portions of the game in which Lillard simply took over — he opened by scoring the Blazers’ first five points, he scored nine consecutive points during one dynamic stretch in the third quarter and he scored six Blazers points in the decisive fourth.”
