Trail Blazers’ winning streak ends with loss to Thunder

The Portland Trail Blazers’ four-game winning streak came to a screeching halt against the Oklahoma City Thunder Sunday afternoon at the Moda Center.

But there’s no shame in losing to the Thunder, even by a score of 118-108.

“I thought we hung in there,” Blazers coach Chauncey Billups said. “I thought we played hard. We played well. We played pretty much even with them for three quarters.”

The Blazers’ four-game run produced a defensive rating of 99.2, the best in the NBA during that stretch.

The Thunder, who have the league’s best record, weren’t impressed. They entered the game as one of the most balanced in the NBA, ranked No. 1 in defensive rating (103.7) and No. 6 in offensive rating.

The Thunder dominated Portland in virtually every imaginable way. Points in the paint (52-22), turnovers (8-15), second-chance points (28-13).

The Blazers’ inability to keep the Thunder out of the paint proved to be impossible to overcome.

“That’s everybody’s problem,” Billups said. “They’re the best in the league at it. We talked about it. They put their head down and they drive, drive, drive, drive, kick, swing all game.”

If not for the Blazers’ better-than-usual shooting from three-point range (45%), this game could have gotten ugly.

Toumani Camara scored a career-high 24 points on 8-for-11 shooting. Deni Avdija’s 28 points and eight assists were both season highs. He also had eight rebounds.

Scoot Henderson came off the bench to score 25 points while shooting 5 of 11 from beyond the arc. Anfernee Simons scored 14 and Jerami Grant didn’t make his first and only basket until early in the fourth quarter.

Shai Gilgeous-Alexender led the Thunder with 35 points on 12-of-25 shooting. Jalen Williams scored 24.

The Blazers took an early 14-4 lead in the first with two threes from Camara and one from Avdija. But the Thunder, led by Gilgeous-Alexander’s 12 points, dominated the rest of the quarter to make the score 27-27 entering the second.

The Thunder pushed their lead to 19 points and took a 66-53 advantage into halftime.

The Blazers hung around in the third and fell behind by 15 in the fourth quarter before rallying to trail 110-104, when Anfernee Simons hit a three with 2:37 remaining.

But the Blazers couldn’t put together defensive stops to get them a chance to win.

“You have one tough quarter, and treading uphill against a good team makes it tough,” Billups said.

WHAT IT MEANS

The Blazers (17-29) hung tough with the Thunder (37-8) for the second time this season. Portland lost 109-99 at Oklahoma City on Nov. 20.

“It’s the first seed in the West,” Avdija said. “A great team. I feel like we did a lot of great things. We’ve been playing better, coming off a four-game winning streak. You can just see how we’re playing much, much better, and how we’re growing individually and as a team.”

The Blazers and Thunder will meet for the final time this season on Mar. 7 in Oklahoma City.

NEXT UP

The Blazers host Damian Lillard and the Milwaukee Bucks (25-18) at 7 p.m. Tuesday.

— Aaron Fentress | afentress@Oregonian.com | @AaronJFentress (Twitter), @AaronJFentress (Instagram), @AaronFentress (Facebook)