The Portland Trail Blazers treated their Tuesday evening game with the Toronto Raptors like a cat treats the back door. In it. Out of it. In it again. Out of it again. Like a proper feline, though, the Blazers ended up not only in it, but ready to jump on the counter for a proper can of Fancy Feast.

Trailing by as many as 16 in the second half, Portland came back to make Toronto sweat, cutting the lead to 2 with less than a minute remaining. It wasn’t quite enough. Ultimately, the Blazers would endure a 121-118 loss, sending their record to 8-13. It was a nice effort with a result just shy of optimal.

Here are several factors that played into the outcome.

Portland wants to get the ball to the rim so badly now. Almost every offensive set revolves around penetration. Via pass or dribble, it doesn’t matter. They’re pushing it right to the restricted area, then either putting it up or kicking it out against a compacted defense. It’s so simple, so determined as to almost be cute.

One of the problems tonight was that, despite this attack, the Blazers scored only 50 in the paint as opposed to 64 for the Raptors. Toronto is GOOD at this aspect of the game, but still.

Another problem with Portland’s approach: they didn’t police the boards. Toronto got 10 offensive rebounds, Portland 9. For a team that wanted to win the interior battle, Portland let this one go pretty easily.

Arguably the Blazers played better in the first half than the second. Their game was prettier, more coordinated. But the Raptors were HOUSING Portland in offensive rebounds and turnovers forced, earning a 10-shot-attempt lead in the boxscore.

As ugly as the second half was, the Blazers narrowed the gap in offensive rebounds to 10-9 and in turnovers to 17-14. That left them a 7-shot deficit in attempts. That was enough to keep the game close and avoid the blowout. It wasn’t, however, enough to win.

One of the aspects of Portland’s game that has started to slip lately is transition defense. It may be injuries. It may be fatigue. It may be lack of focus. Whatever the cause, the Blazers are looking like non-entities on the break, both running back and challenging at the finish. Tonight the Raptors scored 25 on the run, a disastrous number for Portland, especially since the Blazers themselves managed only 10.

The Blazers threw a comparatively huge amount of zone defense out there against the Raptors. It makes some homespun sense. Toronto is one of the best paint scoring teams in the league.

As we’ve said before, this is not Portland’s best defensive look. They aren’t good at covering the three out of it. It’s collapse and bail and they always have to collapse because dribblers get in seams. It also kind of messes with their aggressiveness at the point of attack. They don’t force turnovers.

Toronto was already doing pretty well before the third period started. When the Blazers came out with the zone look again after allowing 65 points in the first half, the Raptors barbequed them.

Portland chilled out on the zoning in the fourth and they managed to come back. This isn’t a one-to-one thing, but yeah, I don’t like the zone for this team.

Jerami Grant had a great fourth quarter, bringing the Blazers back within shouting distance, never giving up. He even hit a leaning three with 1.8 seconds left to keep the threads of hope alive. Grant shot an ultra-efficient 7-11 on the way to 19 points. He had 2 blocks and a steal besides.

Toumani Camara hitting 6-10 from the three-point arc on his way to 21 points. It was such a relief to see him shoot well beyond the arc.

Deni Avdija had a career-defining 14 assists, scoring 25 alongside. He’s performing incredibly out there. He shot 10-15 from the free throw line. You can look at that two ways. He drew 15 foul shots! Yay! He also missed 5. It seems cheap to ask him to hit more. It also seems cheap to point out the offensive foul on Portland’s pre-penultimate play of the game and getting his shot blocked on the true penultimate one, both of which could have changed the outcome. But we’ll be a little cheap while fully admitting that overall, Deni is superstar-ing it out there.

The Blazers travel to Cleveland to face the Cavaliers tomorrow in the second of back-to-back games. 4:00 PM, Pacific is the start time.