The Blazers were in San Antonio tonight looking to get their third win of the season in San Antonio and early on things looked promising as the Blazers jumped out to a 23-4 lead. From there the legs got tired and the Spurs behind DeMar DeRozan and Bryn Forbes defeated the Blazers, 113-110

You could not ask for much more from the Blazers in the first quarter from the Blazers. CJ McCollum continued his hot streak, Rodney Hood had a nice start, and Kent Bazemore comes in playing lights out defense. Baze had some highlight-reel chase-down blocks. One came on a much faster Dejounte Murray early in the 2nd. I'm still not sure how he caught him. He turned on a gear I didn't know he had. The second came when he chased down a LaMarcus Aldridge turn around jumper on the low block. Baze was on the opposite side of the floor at the top or arch when Aldridge caught the ball.

The Spurs started chipping at the lead through the second quarter. The Blazers started missing shots and DeRozan started making them. The Spurs cut the lead to six at half time. Ending the quarter on a heat streak. It continued in the third with the Spurs outscoring the Blazers by 17, 37-20

Damian Lillard shooting a Westbrookian 3-19 from the field through the first three quarters did not help matters.

Behind some hot shoot by Patty Mills the Spurs pushed the lead to 19 points with about five minutes left to go. Then Lillard started clicking and the Blazers went on a 20-2 run, cutting the lead down to one with just over a minute to go.

The Spurs pushed it back up to five points with 47 seconds left after a soft shot by Derrick White and a couple of free throws by LaMarcus Aldridge. The Blazers had a couple of chances to tie the game with under 20 seconds to go, but Dame and Anthony Tolliver both missed three-pointers.

The door was not closed though.

DeRozan was fouled with 7.8 seconds left and missed both free throws. The Spurs led 113-110 and Portland had one more chance to tie the game. Lillard got a great look at the shot and the ball was three-quarters of the way down and it bounced out. I'm not sure how that didn't stay down.

Lillard scored the last 18 points for the Blazers to end the game. He finished with 28, 9, and 7 tonight. He only had one turnover tonight.

CJ finished with 27, Hood had 11, Simons and Skal Labissiere each had 10.

Random thoughts

Anfernee Simons to give the Blazers really good minutes at both backcourt positions. I'd like to see him be a bit more of a facilitator, but the kid can score.

The Blazers missed Zach Collins tonight.

I thought that Terry Stotts would pull the starters out down by 19 with just over five minutes left. The Blazers almost made a great comeback. This is why he is a head coach in the NBA and we sit at home and write about it. Terry Stotts plays to win the game!

No double-double tonight for Hassan Whiteside. He seemed a step off tonight. He played a lot the night before.

The Blazers lost that lead tonight because they were tired and just stopped playing when they got up 19. You could tell the Spurs were the fresher team. Once the Spurs got up 19 they started to play tight and didn't close out. But you just can't rule out Damian Lillard on any night though. He might be on an MVP season right now.

Next up

The Blazers have Tuesday off before they head up to Oklahoma City to finish up their road trip.