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Blazers Can’t Hit in the Clutch, Lose Narrowly to Pistons

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Portland did all they could, but just couldn’t produce enough points.

The Portland Trail Blazers and Detroit Pistons played a barn-burner on Sunday evening. If barns were burned by missed threes, that is. After building an 18-point lead in the second half, the Pistons succumbed to a big offensive run by Anfernee Simons, aided somewhat by prior scoring from Jerami Grant that kept the game in reach. Portland cut the lead down to three in the final minute, but most of their non-Simons shots were coming from outside. They couldn’t hit the deep shot late, or for most of the game. The Blazers went 15-50, 30% behind the arc, the Pistons 9-28, 32.1%. The difference was, Detroit had enough inside scoring to make up for it in a 119-112 Pistons victory.

Simons finished the game with 34 points, Grant with 25.

With misgivings, it’s Anfernee Simons. The story with him, and the team really, was the same as it has been for the last couple weeks. Portland did not play good defense. Simons became a frequent target of opponent attacks. He didn’t have enough help around him to keep him from being exposed.

That put a ton of pressure on Portland’s offense. As usual, Ant was the guy who delivered. He shot 14-26 from the field on his way to those 34 points. He’s the only Blazer who can score enough to win a game with offense. By gum, he tried—and largely delivered—tonight.

The Blazers got destroyed in the paint tonight. With a minute left in the third quarter, they had tallied only 14 points inside against 40 for Detroit. Anfernee Simons went on a heater to add 4 to the total before the buzzer sounded on the period, but that still left Portland on the wrong side of a double-up in the lane. The Pistons decided to take away dribble penetration at all costs. The Blazers coughed up the ball, stalled on drives, and passed out for threes instead. They couldn’t hit enough of the latter to make up for the former.

Diana Taurasi is a force. Her accolades span pages and pages, she’s largely considered the greatest of all time in the WNBA, and she’s one of the most fun trash-talkers to watch play. Skylar Diggins-Smith, also being a force, a trash talker, and an All-Star guard, seemed like a great fit next to Taurasi on the Phoenix Mercury. “Seemed” is the key word here.

The final tally in the paint was 50 Detroit, 30 Portland.

Honorable Mention: Down three points in the last 90 seconds of the game, the Blazers missed three open threes in a row before the margin got out of reach.

Honestly? The holes in Portland’s roster. The Blazers miss Deni Avdija so bad on perimeter defense. All the Pistons had to do was stay away from Toumani Camara and they had a red-carpet walkway into the lane on penetration. Poor Donovan Clingan was left deciding whether to stay with his man or cover the suddenly-loose driver. When he did the former, Detroit scored unopposed. When he did the latter, Clingan’s man just scooped up the rebound on the miss and put it in unopposed. You can find the commonality between those two sentences fairly easily.

On offense, the lack of a real point guard showed up drastically in the starting lineup. Simons mustered mostly iso shots. Shaedon Sharpe stalled or turned over the ball when he tried to initiate. Whipping the rock around the perimeter became Portland’s only steady passing opportunity. It wasn’t pretty and it wasn’t enough.

Boxscore

The Blazers draw the Golden State Warriors tomorrow night in San Fran with a 7:00 PM, Pacific start.

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NEWS IN PHOTOS: “Trail Blazers”

PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — Cade Cunningham scored 28 points, Tobias Harris added 20 points on 9-of-13 shooting and the Detroit Pistons defeated the Portland Trail Blazers 119-112 on Sunday night.

Jalen Duren finished with 18 points and 12 rebounds for Detroit (36-29).

The Pistons took the lead for good when Isaiah Stewart scored inside to make it 33-32 early in the second quarter and Cunningham made a layup that pushed Detroit’s lead to 92-74 with 3:08 remaining in the third.

Anfernee Simons led Portland (28-37) with 34 points on 14-of-26 shooting and Jerami Grant scored 25. Scoot Henderson added 15 points and Shaedon Sharpe scored 12 but the young duo combined to made 8 of 25 from the field, 1 of 11 from behind the arc.

Takeaways

Pistons: Detroit gave away most of an 18-point second-half lead but showed resolve down the stretch to hold off the Blazers in the second of back-to-back games and the last of a four-game road trip.

Trail Blazers: Portland made 15 3-pointers but shot just 30% from behind the arc and 39% overall.

Key moment

After Portland’s Duop Reath hit a 3-pointer to cap a 13-6 run, Dennis Schroder made a running floater with about 2 minutes left to give Portland a 113-108 lead.

Key stat

There were 51 total fouls called and the teams combined to shoot 64 free throws (32 each) — an average of 1.3 free-throw attempts per minute.

Up next

The Pistons play the first of two home games against the Washington Wizards in a three-day span on Tuesday. Portland hits the road to play the Golden State Warriors on Monday.

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The Associated Press created this story using technology provided by Data Skrive and data from Sportradar.

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AP NBA: https://apnews.com/hub/nba

TJD shines in impromptu Santa Cruz Warriors G League stint originally appeared on NBC Sports Bay Area

SAN FRANCISCO – It had been one year and almost exactly four months – 485 days in total – since Trayce Jackson-Davis last wore a Santa Cruz Warriors jersey.

Jackson-Davis was a rookie then, still finding his footing in the NBA and trying to make his mark with Golden State. A 28-point, 12-rebound double-double at any level will help. The No. 57 overall pick in the 2023 NBA Draft eventually became a main part of the Warriors’ rotation as a rookie, becoming their starting center for the final month of the season.

He held that title to begin his second professional campaign, but as the season has gone on, Jackson-Davis’ opportunities have dwindled. Instead of putting his head down and pouting, he has focused on being the best teammate possible and jumped at the chance of playing for Santa Cruz on Sunday at Chase Center.

After scoring two points in the first quarter, Jackson-Davis turned the volume up on his aggression, finishing the Sea Dubs’ 118-107 win against the Mexico City Capitanes with 22 points, eight rebounds and three blocked shots. His plus-26 in 35 minutes was a game-high, emphasizing what kind of impact Jackson-Davis had on Santa Cruz snapping its five-game losing streak.

“I thought I played well,” Jackson-Davis said. “Missed some free throws. I just have to continue to work on that. But just getting my wind back. I kind of let the game come to me, especially in the first quarter kind of getting used to everything. I haven’t played in a while.

“It’s been like three weeks since I got significant playing time, so just trying to get my legs back under me and then taking advantage of the opportunity.”

Prior to the Warriors’ win over the Detroit Pistons on Saturday night, Jackson-Davis was a DNP (Did Not Play) in 10 of Golden State’s previous 16 games. But when Kevon Looney was whistled for three fouls in two minutes during the first quarter Saturday, Jackson-Davis had his number called.

He only played two minutes, in which he recorded one assist and blocked one shot.

Santa Cruz head coach Nicholas Kerr said in his pregame press conference that Jackson-Davis likely would play in short stints and wouldn’t play something like 36 minutes. Well, he fell one minute short of that.

Coaches came to Jackson-Davis after the third quarter when he already had played 24 minutes and asked how he was feeling. Jackson-Davis, who turned 25 years old on Feb. 22, was all for as many minutes as possible. The plan was for him to play all of the fourth quarter. That is, until, Jackson-Davis had a bit of an injury scare.

Former Warrior Juan Toscano-Anderson was on the other side of a physical play on Jackson-Davis that was reviewed for a possible flagrant foul. Jackson-Davis remained on the ground for a short bit. Once he was back up, he was seen grabbing his back and trying to stretch his right side. Though he initially remained in the game, Jackson-Davis soon after had to remove himself for the final minute.

Not to worry, he says it was just a cramp and he’ll be good to go Monday against the Portland Trail Blazers if needed.

TJD says it was just a cramp and with Santa Cruz up by 12 and the game almost over there was no need to push it https://t.co/gNsqADMXZj

— Dalton Johnson (@DaltonJ_Johnson) March 9, 2025

Familiarity wasn’t on Jackson-Davis’ side. He met the majority of his Santa Cruz teammates for the day earlier Sunday, aside from a few faces like Warriors guard Pat Spencer. Once the settling in phase was over, Jackson-Davis was the player who has helped the Warriors plenty of times the past two seasons.

“His aggressiveness in the paint,” Kerr pointed out. “Obviously anytime we can get him downhill off a ball screen he’s a lob threat and he got a couple of those. I thought he ran super hard in transition. He constantly got himself into the paint, and then he rebounded pretty well too.”

Check. Check. And check. Those are the boxes the Warriors want to see Jackson-Davis dominate at the NBA level whenever he’s on the floor.

While his teammates for Jackson-Davis’ one-game stint weren’t the same he has built sweat equity with, who he has done so alongside made sure to be in the arena. Steve Kerr was there, as was assistant coaches Seth Cooper and Anthony Vereen, general manager Mike Dunleavy, owner Joe Lacob and executive vice president of basketball operations Kirk Lacob.

Teammates Brandin Podziemski, Gui Santos Quinten Post and Kevin Knox, who sat on Santa Cruz’s bench, watched Jackson-Davis do what he does best.

Dubs supporting Dubs 🤝 pic.twitter.com/LQwBKgJItj

— Warriors on NBCS (@NBCSWarriors) March 9, 2025

Draymond Green even made a fourth-quarter appearance, and Gary Payton II joined Toscano-Anderson after the game for a talk in front of Warriors fans.

“Man, it means the world,” Jackson-Davis said. “It just shows that we’re a family. We have great teammates and it’s just us. That’s what we always say. That just shows that they care. They care about me, they care about this organization and at the end of the day I appreciate them a lot because it was great seeing them out there.”

The Warriors have a little over a month remaining in the regular season. Jackson-Davis will stay at the ready for whatever role is required. Taking advantage of what he saw as an opportunity, not a demotion, the big man shined for Santa Cruz on his home court in front of a deep Warriors contingent.

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