Who says you can’t go home again?
Certainly not Damian Lillard.
The former Trail Blazers star returned to Portland for the first time since his trade to the Bucks over the offseason.
Lillard acknowledged before Wednesday’s 119-116 loss that it would be an emotional night for him to be back in the place he called home his entire first part of his career while indicating he could see himself back there one day.
“Because of how I feel about Portland… my time that I’ve spent here. In my mind, that’s where I always felt that my career would end,” ESPN reported Lillard saying.
Lillard, who spent 11 seasons in the Rose City after the Blazers selected him sixth overall in 2012, was greeted by a standing ovation from the fans after he was introduced as part of the Bucks starting lineup on Wednesday night.
The point guard scored 19,376 points during his time with the Trail Blazers — making him the franchise’s all-time scoring leader — and made seven NBA All-Star appearances.
He scored 25 points with seven assists and six rebounds in Wednesday’s loss, adding memorable dunk late in the fourth quarter as the Bucks attempted a comeback.
“These types of games where there’s a lot of meaning and lot of emotion, these are always fun,” Lillard said after the Bucks’ loss. “These games have a little bit more juice in them. That’s what tonight was. It was an entertaining game.”
“My relationship to the city and the fans here, the organization, it’s never ending,” Lillard said, according to The Athletic. “I don’t look at it as closure or anything like that, I just know that it’s something that doesn’t happen often. To come into a city as a draft pick, to be able to have so many accomplishments, to have a good relationship with the fans, a good relationship with the organization, to experience a lot of success. … It’s going to be a huge part of my legacy and what I’ve been able to accomplish as a man, as an athlete.”
Though Lillard emphasized his commitment to the Bucks, he also left the door open to a potential return to the franchise that drafted him before his career ends.
“Right now, I’m just in a space of like, this is where I am now. I’m in Milwaukee. I wanted the opportunity to contend and our team has an opportunity to contend for this year and years to come and I’m just living in that. But I definitely, when I was traded, I see a day where I’ll be in a Trail Blazer uniform again before I’m done.”
Lillard told reporters pregame that he almost out of instinct had walked to the home locker room on Wednesday and that it was his first time in the visitor’s room at Modo Center.
Wednesday was the second time that Lillard faced his former team after the Bucks and Trail Blazers played in November in Milwaukee.
Lillard scored 31 points in a game the Bucks won, 108–102.
— with AP