Damian Lillard Is Ready to Consume Your Soul

There are 44 seconds left in the 4th quarter, and Russell Westbrook has just sunk the Portland Trail Blazers. It's their last game before Christmas, also their fourth in five nights, and now they're down six on the road. The death knell is sounding. Defensive keystone Robin Lopez broke his hand last week, but Portland doesn't get a rest because this is the NBA. In a densely packed 82 game season, some nights are bound to be chalked up as "schedule losses," necessarily uphill contests every team has to slog through. Tonight, Portland looks wiped.

That is, until Damian Lillard takes over. After a few missed free throws and the werewolf-ish re-emergence of Westbrook's self-destructive streak, Lillard gets the ball a few feet clear of the three-point line and placidly swishes it over an onrushing Serge Ibaka to force overtime. Halfway into the extra period, there's a furious scramble for the ball around mid-court. Somehow, it pops out to Lillard, who's perched further out on the same radial line from the hoop as his last bomb. Ibaka lunges again, Lillard arcs it over him again. The diminutive point guard has taken a dead night in the Blazers schedule and turned out a manifesto on how to power a team win with raw, uncut swagger.

Portland, now 30-8 and second in the Western Conference, has made a season out of fighting against the grain to win late, and Lillard is the team's beating heart. He shares alpha responsibilities with LaMarcus Aldridge, but Aldridge is a sensible, cerebral player, while Lillard is untamable. Initially conceived of as a three-point specialist, Lillard now sports a near-complete offensive game. He has made more threes this year than Stephen Curry, but if he's denied working room on the perimeter, Lillard is happy to stomp into the lane and dispatch defenders like CGI orcs in a Peter Jackson movie. With his range and unimpeachable cool, Lillard is the ideal type of player to close out games.

With Lillard and Aldridge, who is looking more like Dirk Nowitzki every game, the Blazers have as good a pair of options as any team. Coach Terry Stotts runs a Mavericks-esque system that his players have fully committed to, and Portland sports the NBA's seventh most efficient offense and second best defense. NBA history dictates that finishing the season in the top 10 of both categories is indicative of championship quality. In short, everything has gone about as well as it could have for Portland so far.

But despite all their schematic wizardry, the Blazers still have a fragility about them. They shoot too many long two-pointers and their bench is stocked with role players who are either too young or too old or too Meyers Leonard. Last season, the club avoided significant injuries altogether, which, combined with their jump shooting tendencies, made them a sexy pick to regress and slide out of the playoffs in 2015. The numbers say they are a championship contender, and Lillard's passing has caught up to his shooting, but they aren't taken as seriously as other elite Western Conference squads.

Lillard, however, has a long history of defying detractors. He's defined himself by his underdog status his whole career. Oakland, his hometown, has produced some of the NBA's best point guards of the past two decades. Jason Kidd and Gary Payton were raised there, and Lillard is the heir to their throne, as anointed by Kidd himself. While the three storied point guards all have different styles, they share a common toughness. Each guy had to earn their position many times over. Lillard had to re-establish himself the most, as he bounced between three different high schools before settling at Oakland High School, then at Weber State in Ogden, Utah.

The path from East Oakland to a tiny mid-major to the NBA lottery and eventual stardom is not exactly well-worn. Lillard roughed his way to the top, shaking off doubt at every stop. Allegations of dogging it on defense followed him all the way to the NBA. So did the notion that he was more flash and style than substantial, meaty efficiency. Lillard has had to scrap for everything he's earned, and he isn't going to let the fire go out now that he is leading one of the best teams in the NBA. As he's said of his Oakland roots, "Oakland carries weight. It means you don't get scared." Watch him stare, unflinching, betraying no emotion after a game-winner, and you'll see how directly that sensibility translates.

Remember that area behind the three-point line where Lillard broke the Thunder last month? It's the same spot where he hit a series-clinching three against Houston in last year's playoffs. When the pressure inevitably scales up in the playoffs, Lillard won't bend or break. Portland is an imperfect team and they may find themselves on the wrong side of the Western Conference playoff meat grinder. But for the first time in a decade, they have the potential for a serious run. How far they go will depend on Lillard.