Trail Blazers show Wolves a textbook finishing kick

Portland ran its streak to 12 victories in a row, and ran away from the undermanned visitors with two deflating nine-point scoring bursts.

By JERRY ZGODA, Star Tribune

Last update: December 31, 2007 - 1:04 AM

PORTLAND, ORE. - The precocious Portland Trail Blazers extended their league-best winning streak Friday night and won for the 12th time in December, a victory total that seems a reasonable season goal for the Timberwolves the way things are going.

They beat the Wolves 109-98 before a big, joyous Rose Garden audience that included one fan who held a sign near the game's conclusion that read, "Who's Next?"

Proving that a team can be both youthful and successful, the Blazers -- the league's youngest team with only one player over the age of 30 and 10 players 24 or younger -- haven't lost since Dec. 2 in San Antonio, a 12-game streak forged by a favorable home schedule and a quantum leap in confidence for a team that had lost nine of its previous 10 games.

The Wolves, meanwhile, lost for the 24th time in their first 28 games, and for the 11th time in 13 games during a December they will spend mostly on the road.

The Blazers delivered their latest victory with a pair of quarter-closing runs -- a 9-0 one that broke a tie and closed the first half, an 18-10 finish to the third quarter -- that made the Wolves' own 13-5 burst that began the second half and Gerald Green's highlight-reel, windmill dunk in the second quarter inconsequential.

A 9-0 run that opened the fourth quarter didn't hurt, either.

"Effort is not our problem," Wolves coach Randy Wittman said. "We've got to figure out ways to end quarters. That's where we've got to get better. We throw the ball away. We take chances. When it's 46-46, we've got to be tied at halftime at the worst or maybe leading by a few points."

The Blazers won again with 2007 NBA Rookie of the Year Brandon Roy, who briefly wore a Timberwolves cap on draft night two summers ago, providing another of what teammate Joel Przybilla calls his "quiet" yet so efficient evenings with a 22-point, six-rebound, five-assist game that included a lovely hanging layup around Al Jefferson and an exhibition of defense-suspending crossover moves.

Roy scored seven of those points in the first half, 12 of them in the fourth quarter on a night when the Blazers outrebounded the Wolves 47-32 (including 14 offensive rebounds) and made 21 free throws to the visitors' 12.

"You try to make him work for everything," Wolves rookie Corey Brewer said, "but he makes tough shots."

LaMarcus Aldridge added 21 for the Blazers, who had six players score in double figures. Jefferson scored 22 and Rashad McCants 21 for the Wolves.

The Wolves drafted Roy with the sixth overall pick in 2006 and minutes later traded him to Portland for the rights to seventh pick Randy Foye and cash. Foye, a league All-Rookie Team selection last season, has not played this season because of an injured kneecap that will be tested again in 10 days.

The Blazers' first 9-0 run turned a tie score into a 55-46 halftime advantage from which the Wolves never quite fully recovered. They trimmed that nine-point deficit to one point (60-59) with 4½ minutes gone in the third quarter, but the Blazers finished the quarter by scoring 18 of the next 28 points and then expanded their lead to 18 points with another 9-0 run that opened the fourth quarter.

"That hurts, especially at the end of the second quarter," Brewer said. "They score nine or 10 points and we only lose by nine points. We can't let that happen."

The Wolves came within eight points in the game's final 35 seconds but could come no closer on a night when McCants scored 14 of his 21 points in the fourth quarter and when forward Craig Smith played with a bandage over his eye after an Aldridge elbow opened a gash.

"Games like this can be dangerous," Blazers coach Nate McMillan said. "I was anxious to see how we would respond as a favorite against a team with a poorer record. That we moved the ball so well -- 28 assists and only 12 turnovers -- tells the story."

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