The Portland Trail Blazers defeated the Los Angeles Lakers 118 - 109 at Moda Center on Thursday. The Trail Blazers (16 - 22) improved to 10 - 7 on their home court and saw a strong game from Damian Lillard, who returned to the lineup after a few missed games due to an ankle injury. LIllard's back court teammate, C.J. McCollum, was pullling the weight on the scoring front in Lillard's absence, and continued to pour in points with the back court now at full strength. The Blazers responded stronger in the second half, taking advantage of the Lakers pour ability to close out games, and scored 30 - plus points as a unit in each of the third and fourth quarters. McCollum's driving six foot jumper with just over four minutes remaining in the game put the Blazers up by one point, and the hot shooting McCollum dropped in a long distance three to add to the lead. Portland did not have to look back after that, doing the finishing touches from the free throw line. The Lakers best performer was D'Angelo Russell, who finished the game with 22 points, four rebounds and two assists on 6 - of - 18 shooting. Nick Young managed three buckets from behind the arc, but finished just 3 - of - 9 for the game and scored 13 points. Julius Randle rounded out the box score again, as he went for 17 points, nine rebounds, five assists and one steal. Brandon Ingram drew the start at small forward and finished with 11 points on 3 - of - 6 shooting. Next up, the Lakers play the second game of a back - to - back when they host the Miami Heat, while the Blazers visit the Detroit Pistons on Saturday.
["TeamStat(G,'Trail Blazers') has 22 Losses ,has 118 Total points ,has 16 Points in 3rd quarter ."
 "TeamStat(G,'Lakers') has 109 Losses ,has 22 Total points ."]