Hawks fall short at home in loss Trail Blazers
ATLANTA — Portland’s dominant first quarter gave the Trail Blazers a big lead over Atlanta they never lost.
Damian Lillard said it was especially encouraging to see the focused Blazers turn back the Hawks’ comeback attempt.
Lillard scored 27 points and Portland kept up its playoff push by beating the Hawks 113-97 on Saturday night.
C.J. McCollum had 22 points and Allen Crabbe added 16 for Portland, which raced out to a 17-3 lead that grew to 22 points by the end of the opening period.
“Usually for us, if we have fast starts we allow teams to get back into the game,” Lillard said. “But tonight, I thought we were able to sustain our focus on both ends of the floor. Even when shots stopped falling offensively we still played physical and we helped each other out on the defensive end. That allowed us to hold onto the lead.”
Portland, which has won seven of nine, began the night 2½ games behind Denver for the Western Conference’s final playoff spot.
The Hawks have lost three straight, including the last two at home.
They fell three games behind fourth-place Toronto in the East.
Atlanta held out four-time All-Star forward Paul Millsap after he experienced tightness in his left knee during pregame warmups.
“As a group, you have to kind of step up when a teammate goes down,” coach Mike Budenholzer said. “We didn’t do that in the first quarter.”
Ersan Ilyasova, who started for Millsap, had 23 points. Tim Hardaway Jr. scored 22.
The Trail Blazers took command with a strong start, making 11 of their first 12 shots from the field. A jumper by Lillard pushed the advantage to 32-12. Portland outscored the Hawks 40-18 in the quarter — its biggest margin in any period this season.
The Hawks twice cut the deficit to 11 early in the fourth, including at 89-78 following a layup by Malcolm Delaney.
The Trail Blazers quickly answered with a layup by McCollum.
Budenholzer immediately called a timeout, charged onto the court and confronted Dwight Howard, apparently about the center’s lack of defense on the play.
Tip-ins
Hawks: Howard had 14 points and 10 rebounds . ... Dennis Schroder shot 2 of 14 from the field for nine points . ... Kent Bazemore, who had 12 points, left in the fourth quarter with a bruised right knee.