Damian Lillard On Adjusting To New Offensive System
Portland Trail Blazers star Damian Lillard says his poor form this season is an opportunity to prove himself once again.
Damian Lillard spoke about his slow start after the Blazers’ 113-103 loss to the Philadelphia 76ers on Monday night.
He entered the game averaging 18.3 points, 34.9% from the field and 23.2% from range. All of these figures represent lows in his ten-year NBA career.
For nine of those years, Damian Lillard played under the same coach in Terry Stotts. Lillard was one of basketball’s biggest threats in Stotts’ high ball screen orientated offense.
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Under current coach Chauncey Billups, the Blazers are moving the ball a lot more. Billups admits it has had an impact on Lillard as well as CJ McCollum.
Lillard, who entered the game against the 76ers averaging career lows in points (18.3), field goal percentage (34.9%) and 3-point shooting (23.2%), once again couldn’t get going outside of a brief seven-point surge in the middle of the fourth quarter.Â
“Yeah. I mean, you probably can put some of that on it,” Chauncey Billups said.Â
“They both have done a good job of just trying to do what’s kind of been asked. Defenses are obviously doing the same thing with Dame. They trap him, he’s doing a good job of getting off of it and there’s too many times where we don’t make teams pay for that.”
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“I always look at struggles as an opportunity to show my true character,” Lillard said.
“When things go great there’s a lot of praise that goes along with that. A lot of people give you a lot of credit. They speak highly of you on social media, TV. ‘Oh Dame had 60, Dame had 50.’ They speak really highly of you. But I think it says more when you’re going through something and s— is kind of hitting the fan and you’re struggling and everybody’s got something to say and to me the real ones, they can keep on trucking and keep on going and still find a way to get the job done.â€
