The Portland Trail Blazers earned the Western Conference’s No. 7 seed Tuesday night with a 114-110 win over the Phoenix Suns in a play-in game that felt unstable all the way to the finish.
Portland’s hero was Deni Avdija, who delivered a brilliant 41-point, 12-assist performance and supplied the game’s signature play late, converting a crucial three-point play with 16.1 seconds remaining, leading the Blazers back from an 11-point fourth-quarter deficit.
@opencourtDENI AVDIJA WAS PHENOMENAL AND LED THE BLAZERS TO THE NBA PLAYOFFS. Avdija finished with 41 points, 7 rebounds, 12 assists and 2 blocks. HE WAS CLUTCH! 🔥🤯
The Suns themselves had rallied from an earlier 14-point deficit, before building the 11-point lead in the fourth quarter, putting themselves in position to secure the West’s No. 7 seed at home. Instead, Portland finished on a powerful closing surge, with Matisse Thybulle helping seal the result with a steal that led to a Jerami Grant dunk. In a game this close, execution in the final seconds was everything, and the Blazers were sharper when the pressure peaked.
Phoenix did not collapse quietly. Jalen Green scored 35 points for the Suns, and Phoenix had enough offense for long stretches to look like the team that would survive the night. But the Suns could not protect the lead when Portland raised the temperature late, and that is the cruel lesson of the play-in: control means very little if it does not hold through the final possessions.
For Portland, the reward is immediate and significant. The win sends the Blazers into the playoffs as the No. 7 seed, where they will face the San Antonio Spurs in the first round. For Phoenix, the loss is not the end, but it is a damaging miss. The Suns now have to regroup for one more elimination-stage test, while Portland gets the cleaner prize for winning the game that went down the wire and then belonged to them at the very end.
