Trail Blazers End Pacers Win Streak

Towns had 11 points against Portland last month, while Andrew Wiggins was held to 16 and made 5 of 17 from the floor.

The Wolves led 63-46 early in the third quarter, but the Blazers’ Damian Lillard and C.J. McCollum got hot and the Timberwolves didn’t have an answer for them.

PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — The Blazers weren’t going to let this one slip away down the stretch.

Damian Lillard had 26 points and backcourt partner CJ McCollum added 21, and the Portland Trail Blazers snapped Indiana’s six-game winning streak with a 123-111 victory Thursday night. Allen played the second half strong, with a few clutch three-point shots in the fourth that helped keep the Pacers at bay.

Portland will now head out on the road for four games.

IN is 12-5 on the season, 6-3 on the road and 12-5 against the spread.

Warriors 112, Raptors 109: TORONTO – Stephen Curry made nine 3-pointers and scored 44 points, leading undefeated Golden State to a victory over Toronto. The visiting Pacers are coming off an impressive 103-91 win over the Los Angeles Clippers at the Staples Center on Wednesday night. Lillard and Crabbe hit consecutive 3s for Portland, but Miles hit his own to close the gap to 111-107.

Portland forward Al-Farouq Aminu – nicknamed “The Chief” – had the primary defensive responsibility for George.

With Wiggins hitting his first five shots and scoring 10 points and six other Wolves scoring, Minnesota broke open a 17-17 game by finishing the first quarter on a 15-5 run to lead 32-22 after a first quarter in which the Wolves outrebounded the Blazers and committed just one turnover. In their game against the Dallas Mavericks on December 1st, the Blazers were ahead by as many as ten points with five minutes left in the fourth quarter.

Earlier in the day George was named Eastern Conference Player of the Month. “It felt really good”. The biggest reason for the Pacers’ success right now is Paul George as he has gotten back into All-Star form after the horrific injury but overall the Pacers are loaded on the wings. “I’ve got to do better”. Towns scored 7 points, including his first 3-pointer as a pro, in a span of seven minutes to get Minnesota within two points with 1:13 left.

After combining for seven-first half points, McCollum and Lillard finished with 36. While its hard to get a good handle of last year’s Indiana Pacers team, they played better with him off the court. They only had six fouls in the second half…. The Pacers weren’t as sharp as usual on the second night of a back-to-back. IN coach Frank Vogel has been working to sculpt a fast, swarming defense out of the team’s new personnel in order to take advantage of their small-ball inclination.

The Pacers had declined to extend his contract this offseason, so it looked this season was expected to be his last in IN but now his time with the team could be ending sooner than expected. With the loss, Minnesota drops to 8-10 on the season and 2-7 at home. He scored a game-high 34 versus the Timberwolves in their first meeting this year.

“He was player of the month, been getting 30 on everybody so we knew that it wasn’t going to be one guy to go out there and stop him”, Lillard said.