Blazers rally to stun Suns in play-in, grab West's No. 7 seed - ESPN

PHOENIX — Deni Avdija scored 41 points, including a go-ahead 3-point play with 16.1 seconds left, and the Portland Trail Blazers clawed back from an 11-point deficit in the fourth quarter to beat the Phoenix Suns 114-110 in the NBA's play-in tournament Tuesday night.

Jordan Goodwin drove for a layup to give the Suns a 110-109 lead with 32 seconds left, but Avdija responded with a physical take to the rim, making a layup while getting fouled and made the free throw for a 112-110 lead.

The Suns had a chance to go back ahead, but Jalen Green's 3-pointer was off the mark. Goodwin grabbed the offensive rebound but was stripped by Matisse Thybulle to seal the win for the Blazers.

Portland earned the No. 7 seed in the Western Conference playoffs and will face the San Antonio Spurs in the first round.

The Suns will host the winner of the Clippers-Warriors game Friday. Whoever wins that matchup will earn the No. 8 seed and face the top-seeded Oklahoma City Thunder in the playoffs; the loser's season will be over.

«I told the guys, 'Listen, this is a game of momentum. It's a game of runs. They just had their run, now we're going to have ours,'» Blazers interim coach Tiago Splitter said. "'Just be ready, just keep pushing. It's going to come.' And it did.

«You've got to be patient sometimes. And it's easy to just go down and kind of give up, but they didn't. That's why the first thing I said — the resilience of this group, to keep fighting, to find ways to score, to find ways to defend, to believe in the scout and the plan that we had before the game. And they kept doing it, and we found a way to win.»

The final few minutes of Tuesday night's game were intense, with the lead changing several times.

Jerami Grant, who returned after