Monday, December 28, 2009

Philly 104, Portland 93


I couldn't have asked for a better scenario. Lori was having some friends over and I had a free evening, so I bought myself a single ticket to tonight's Trail Blazers game, figuring they'd make quick work of the lowly 76ers and extend their improbable winning streak to five.

Pfft! Didn't happen.

The Blazers used their superior talent to build a halftime lead but then lost it in the third quarter and never regained it, suffering an embarrassing loss to one of the NBA's worst teams.

There's never a guarantee, even when you think the game is a gimme. A win would have been nice, though, because everything went so right. An early dinner of turkey leftovers, a short walk to the bus stop for a five-minute ride to the Rose Garden, a great aisle seat in the third deck -- even a decent shot of the court and the scoreboard (above) before the game started.

I was looking at the Blazers' schedule at halftime and mentally penciling in a game or two I might attend in February. Now I've got second thoughts. (Yes, I know I sound spoiled. Everybody loves a winner. Even with the loss, the Blazers are still just a half-game out of first place in their division. But had they won, they'd be in first place as I write this.)

Oh, well, maybe the best thing about the evening is that I walked home from the game in the cool, crisp air. It took only 25 minutes and it made me think, "How cool is this?" Hard to beat for an urban experience, when you live so close to the arena you don't have to drive or even take public transportation to the game.

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