A team like the Trail Blazers experiences a myriad of many ups and down throughout the course of an NBA season, and nowhere is that more evident than in the post-game locker room. While they've been a surprisingly resilient and even-keeled group despite their relative youth and inexperience, you can still typically sense a difference in the collective mood of the locker room after a particularly disappointing loss or an especially exciting victory. Emotions are going to fluctuate on a night-to-night basis during an 82-game season, even on the most mentally strong teams. That's part of the reason professional sports are so compelling in the first place.

But there are some things you'll hear in Portland's locker room post-game regardless of whether they just secured an impressive victory or found themselves on the wrong end of a tough defeat. Be it a win or a loss, at home or on the road, there's a sentiment that is sure to be uttered in one form or another as players change out of their uniforms and into street clothes.

"Lemme get some of that lotion."

While moisturizing is nowhere near as important for athletes as stretching or getting your ankles tapes, it's just as common of a practice in most NBA locker rooms, including Portland's. Just like your average wage earner has menial tasks they have to do at the end of every shift, such as filling out a time card or logging off their computer, most members of the Trail Blazers take time to apply lotion before heading home after a night of work.

"We sweat a lot, so you shower," said Trail Blazers point guard Damian Lillard. "Your skin gets dried out when you’re using so much soap. You use soap so often — we shower after every practice, after every game, after we get out the hot tub -- that our skin is going to be dry, especially with a lot of weather changes, so it’s important (to moisturize). That’s just proper etiquette. That’s part of taking care of your skin, taking care of your body, taking care of yourself."

There's a number of issues that conspire to wreck havoc on an NBA player's skin throughout the course of the NBA season. As Lillard points out, there's the necessity of showering multiples times a day, which alone is bad enough for your skin. And on the road, the moisture-robbing properties of multiple showers intensifies due to hotels providing different soaps of varying quality and the variations in both water quality and hardness from city to city. So being regimented in terms of applying lotion is important for players who want their skin to look and feel its best.

"You work out a lot, you get funky, you got to take a shower," said veteran wing Gerald Henderson. "When you take showers, you take all the natural oils off your body, so then you’ve got to put them back in, re-hydrate yourself with lotion. It’s like putting on deodorant: once you take it off in the shower, you’ve got to put it back on."

"I have naturally dry skin, so that’s the main reason why I (moisturize)," said Lillard. "The amount of traveling we do, the amount of sweating we do, it’s important."

The reasons given for why players on Portland's roster moisturize generally fall into two categories. The first is the general notion that hydrated skin simply feels better than the alternative. Players already suffer countless scrapes and bruises throughout the season, so why compound those issues with the pain of dry, cracked skin?

"If you feel all dried up, you don’t feel good," said Henderson. "It’s not natural."

But the much more pressing concern among players is how dry skin looks. The notion of having dry, flaky skin, commonly known as being "ashy," is simply unacceptable in Portland's locker room.

"I (moisturize) because if I don’t do it, I’m gonna be ashy," said third-year guard/forward Allen Crabbe. "I don’t want to walk around ashy, that’s the main reason why I do it... Even ashy hands, can’t do it. I need to put lotion on, stay moisturized."

"It’s just like, come on man, that’s embarrassing," said Lillard of his reaction to ashy skin. "You don’t want to look like that, you don’t want to present yourself that way."

Ashy skin is particularly problematic when you consider players perform in front huge crowds watching in arena and on television while wearing little more than loose fitting tank tops and shorts. That's a lot of exposure, both literally and figuratively, so keeping your skin looking as healthy as possible through moisturization is paramount for NBA players.

"You’ve got to take care of your skin" said Henderson. "You can’t be going out there ashy."

Of the players queried about their lotion use, only Mason Plumlee and Chris Kaman responded that they did not typically apply lotion. Rookie Pat Connaughton said he does moisturize, though how much benefit he's deriving from it due to the quality of the lotion he uses was called into question by his more veteran teammates.

"Pat was telling me he uses the hotel lotion, that’s just not going to get it done," said Henderson. "It’s usually not very hydrating and it usually has some kind of scent that I’m not going to like."

Not that everyone is as discerning about which lotion they use. Crabbe prefers Aveeno or Jergens, with Jergens Shea Butter being his favorite. Henderson doesn't necessarily has a preferred brand, but he seeks out options with cocoa butter. For Lillard, it doesn't much matter what he puts on post-game, as he's going to reapply soon thereafter anyway.

"At home, I don’t use simple stuff," said Lillard. "Even the stuff I put in my hair is different at home. That’s why in the locker room a lot of times I’ll put lotion on my arms and face and stuff and as soon as I get home I wash it off. I always wash it off, them I moisturize my face, put some stuff in my hair and I’ll go to sleep with some different stuff on. I don’t even know the name of that stuff, my girlfriend is the one that’s always like ‘You’ve got to use this and you’ve got to use that’ and I’m like ‘Alright.’ She knows better than I do."

But while there are obviously preferences, many times, those preferences typically aren't strong enough to prompt players to bring their own lotion to games, which is why you can always hear players asking each other about borrowing on a nightly basis.

"Usually we just ask the ball boys if they have lotion," said Crabbe. "Once somebody sees the lotion, sees who has it, it’s like, pass it around so everybody can get it, whoever needs to use it."

"I always have my own," said Henderson, which makes sense considering his veteran status on the team. "I bring some kind of cocoa butter lotion. If anybody wants to share, they can share mine, but it must be returned. That’s just basic rules."

As the regular season comes to a close and as the Trail Blazers prepare for what they hope will be their third-straight playoff appearance, it's more important that ever for the players to take care of their bodies. Keeping pace, or potentially moving up, in the Western Conference standings precludes the Trail Blazers from simply sitting players in order to rest up for the post-season (assuming they get there), but there are steps they can take to make sure they're looking and feeling their best when the playoffs start. And part of that is making sure you are staying hydrated, both inside and out.

"You’re going to have skin colors, skin textures of all different kinds, but I do take care of my skin," said Henderson. "And especially up top here, I can’t have any blemishes, you know what I’m saying? When I’m out there, everything is exposed, so I’ve got to make sure I’m on point."