Trail Blazers’ luck: Where preparation meets opportunity

8:51 AM ET

PORTLAND, Ore. — Monday night following the Trail Blazers’ 98-84 Game 4 win over the Los Angeles Clippers wasn’t the first time Portland point guard Damian Lillard characterized Al-Farouq Aminu as “low maintenance.” To Lillard, the quintessential low-maintenance moment for “Chief” — Aminu’s nickname — came in a loss at Miami last December. Chief went off for 16 points in the first half, but didn’t get a single shot attempt after halftime. After the game, Chief didn’t say a word about it. No complaints, no pouting, no side-eyes.

“I don’t know too many guys who’d be like 16 in the first half, hot, then not say anything,” Lillard said.

Silence wasn’t an option on Monday night for Aminu. In the win, he scored 30 points and collected 10 rebounds, production for which he was led to the dais in Moda Center’s media room and placed in front of a microphone — not that it did much to amplify Chief’s voice. Leaning back in the chair, barely audible over the speakers, Aminu’s languid delivery pretty much mirrored his thoughts on being a low-maintenance teammate.

“I just want somebody to go out there and play hard and that’s all you need out of me,” he said. “I guess that’s what [Lillard] means by it. I’m just easy to get along with.”

Indeed, because there’s something fundamentally agreeable about sharing the court with a guy who drains six of 10 shots from beyond the arc for a team that came into Monday night ranked 15th in postseason effective field goal percentage among the 16 playoff teams. Crazy thing is: Portland ranked fifth in quantified shot quality (qSQ). Quantified shot quality takes in the full context of a shot including location, defensive movement and shot type to estimate the expected field goal percentage (eFG%) for an average player.

The Trail Blazers have struggled to find the basket so far in the playoffs. But that doesn’t mean they haven’t found the shots they’ve wanted. Jaime Valdez/USA TODAY Sports

As everyone from Lillard to coach Terry Stotts on down have said for the past week, the Trail Blazers have been getting good looks since the outset of the series against the Clippers — they just weren’t hitting them.

The Trail Blazers’ eFG% in Game 4 of 48.3 doesn’t qualify as any monumental achievement, but it was their highest mark of the series. More important than the number for Portland was the …

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