Portland Trail Blazers: Top 3 individual performances from the 2018-19 NBA season
The Portland Trail Blazers had a terrific season and reached the Western Conference finals for the first time since 2000. They eventually lost to the Warriors in a fairly one-sided series but still, their achievement can't be undermined. Very few people expected them to reach the Western Conference finals and they hugely overachieved.
The Trail Blazers have one of the best backcourt duos in basketball in the form of Damian Lillard and CJ McCollum. They were superb throughout the season and were the primary reasons for the success of the Blazers.
Seth Curry, Nurkic, Maurice Harkless also provided good support to them. An ill-timed injury to Jusuf Nurkic apparently ended his season before the playoffs but he had played a big role till then.
There were plenty of noteworthy performances throughout the season for the Blazers. We will have a look at the top three individual performances from the 2018-19 season:
#3 Damian Lillard 51 points performance against the Oklahoma City Thunder
In a regular season matchup between the Portland Trail Blazers and the Oklahoma City Thunder on March 7, 2019, Damian Lillard destroyed the Thunders by dropping 51 points to go along with his 9 assists.
The match went into the first overtime. The Thunders eventually won by a scoreline of 129-121 courtesy of great performances by Russell Westbrook and Paul George.
Lillard shot an incredible 15-28 from the field and 18-20 from the FT line. He kept on driving throughout the match and made it very difficult for the Thunder defence. But he was trapped by the Thunder defence in the overtime period and the Thunders got their win.
CJ McCollum also provided good support in this match to Damian Lillard. He finished with 25 points and 5 rebounds.