Blazers All-Star point guard Damian Lillard broke out of his early-season slump with a game-high 27 points, to go along with 7 assists and 6 rebounds in Portland’s impressive 101-82 win against the visiting Cleveland Cavaliers.
The Blazers viewed the game a must-win, and managed to contain Cleveland’s vaunted Big Three.
Per The Oregonian:
“It was needed,” All-Star LaMarcus Aldridge said. “It was a must-win game in my mind.”
“They competed,” Damian Lillard said of his teammates’ defense on [LeBron] James. “They made everything tough. They didn’t back down. I think that was why were able to pull it out. They made everything a challenge and they did it for 48 minutes.”
Lillard has told anyone who would listen that he was not worried about his poor start, and, finally, he proved himself correct. […] “I knew that eventually the ball would go in,” Lillard said. “We’re a good team, I know that, (and) we’re going to win games. So I just had to stay with it. Everybody deals with those types of situations. I just happened to deal with it in the first three games. I just had to stay with it. It’s a long season. I had no reason to hang my head or be sad or anything. It’s not like it was the end of the season and that was make-or-break. I’m happy that it happened.”
