After the departure of Gerald Wallace, LaMarcus Aldridge has been left as the lone warrior on the front court and the All-Star has been giving the franchise above his 100 percent. On Thursday, he helped the Portland Trail
Blazers dismantle the New Orleans Hornets ….
LaMarcus Aldridge powered up a double-double night with 25 points and 12 rebounds to help the Portland Trail Blazers beat the New Orleans Hornets 99-93 on Thursday night in Portland.
The Blazers went into the game having beaten the Hornets in 5 previous meetings. So the edge was kind of inclining towards the home team.
The game started with both teams attempting to score from jump shots but failing to do so. The scoring was opened by New Orleans when Hornets guard Greivis Vasquez scored from a jump shot at the 10:58 mark. It took the Blazers
almost 3 minutes to open their scoring account in the game when LaMarcus Aldridge successfully made a hook shot.
Hornets looked in complete control at the start of first quarter as they led by as much as 6, minutes till the later stages of the first period. The charge from Portland came late in the period as they came blazing back to end
the quarter with a 1 point lead 28-27.
Aldridge was Portland`s leading scorer with 8 points, where as Greivis Vasquez and Carl Landry had 8 points each for the Hornets after one.
The early goings of the second quarter had a similar story as both teams went neck to neck to get ahead in the scorer’s table. New Orleans looked more consistent as they went on a 13-2 run outscoring Portland by 27-23 in the second
quarter. Hornets led by 7 points at one point but only managed to close out the quarter with a 3 point lead 54-51.
Aldridge put up 7 more points in the second quarter taking his total to 15 points for the night at the half way mark.
At the start of the second half, Hornets extended their lead to as much as 8 points, 59-51. But Portland came back again by first tying the game and then closing the third quarter on a 9-0 run to lead the Hornets by 6 points, 76-70.
Momentum was on the Blazers side and with the home crowd support; they only needed to push the Hornets of the edge. Even though the Hornets attack looked to have faded but they were not going out that easy. New Orleans went on
an 11-2 run to trim the lead down to two points 83-81 with 6:19 remaining in the game. Marco Belinelli then put up two back to back to tie the game at 87 with 4:51 remaining in the game.
The scores were neck and neck till there were 2:31 remaining in the game. At that point, both Raymond Felton and Nicolas Batum dropped two long range bombs to help the Trail Blazers formulate a 8-3 run to close out the game.
LaMarcus Aldridge had 25 points, 12 rebound (double-double), Wesley Matthews had 18 points and Nicolas Batum had 14 points for the Blazers. Marco Belinelli and Carl Landry had 27 and 24 points respectively for the Hornets.
Portland plays the Los Angeles Clippers next on Friday.
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