Now that the Trail Blazers have rid themselves of Raymond Felton, it looks like their heir apparent to the point guard position is Damian Lillard. The sixth pick in the 2012 draft, Lillard has been making a name for himself at Summer League and showing everyone that although he went to a small college, Weber State, being picked that high was justified. After scoring 31 points in last night’s Blazers win against the Atlanta Hawks, Lillard now leads the summer league in scoring with 27.7 ppg and has three games of 25 points or more.
Of note is that Lillard scored two of his 31 points by putting Hawks forward Keith Benson on a poster with this dunk:
Newly re-signed Blazer, Nicholas Batum, had this to say after seeing Lillard’s dunk:
Ok I just saw the dunk. @Dame_Lillard just send a message to the others big of the league…— Nicolas Batum (@nicolas88batum) July 19, 2012
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According to Lillard, dunking over someone is just a run of the mill thing. Here’s what he told Joe Freeman of The Oregonian:
“I probably caught them off guard, but I’ve done it plenty of times. Once I took off I knew what I was doing as soon as I picked the ball up. But I’m sure he was probably surprised because he tried to block it late.”
The regular season starts on October 30th, which can’t come fast enough for Trail Blazer fans.
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