Two former Trail Blazer guards, who had incredible success during their playing years in Portland, went looking to generate the start of something good in another career Thursday night in Chiles Center.
There was no real one-upping for Pacific’s Damon Stoudamire over Portland’s Terry Porter when the Tigers beat the Pilots 76-65 before 2,023 in Chiles Center. This was merely an early look between the first-year coaches, who undoubtedly will have their teams looking much different as they recruit and mold a culture in years to come.
Right now, it’s a grind. Pacific (10-18, 4-11) and Portland (9-18, 2-13) came into the game as the bottom two teams in the West Coast Conference. The Pilots lost their 13th consecutive game, including the past nine without all-WCC guard Alec Wintering.
“I know he’s feeling the same way I’m feeling about a whole lot of things right now. It’s tough on him the same way it’s been tough on me. I know Terry will get it rolling. They have the right man for the job,” Stoudamire said.
Stoudamire, a high school star at Wilson, coached for the first time in Portland, with a group of friends and family sitting behind the bench. Some have obviously been with the 43-year-old Stoudamire a while.
“One of my friends, he’s up in the back, he’s trying to coach me coach the team. I said, ‘hey, man, I’m not playing no more. You can’t coach me like that,'” Stoudamire said, smiling. “I loved having my family at the game. I’m pretty sure they’ll critique me out in the hallway, but it’s all good.”
Porter, 53, and Stoudamire never played or coached together. Stoudamire, who played for Portland from 1998-2005, was in middle school when Porter began his Blazer career in 1985. Porter says the two know each other through “the brotherhood of the NBA.”
But Porter sees a lot of himself in Stoudamire when it comes to what they tried to accomplish as a player, and now, coaching.
“He had to fight his size always being questioned, and for me, it was my (college) level going small. We both have had chips on our shoulder and wanted to prove the critics wrong. More important, we wanted to be great,” Porter said.
Stoudamire, who served as an NBA and college assistant prior to taking the job at Pacific last March, said the school’s city of Stockton appealed to him.
“People talked about, “Why would you want that job?’ Same things they said about it was the reason I liked it. It was a hard-working, no-nonsense grind city and I felt like I fit there,” Stoudamire said.
Stoudamire’s coaching style is laid back, at least compared to many of his wildly-gesturing, foot-stomping coaching colleagues. Stoudamire sat on the bench for the game’s first seven minutes before he got up. Even while standing, Stoudamire often had one hand in his pocket while calmly observing the action.
Told he’ll never make a name for himself without all the sideline hysterics, Stoudamire smiled.
“I believe in coaching in practice. I’m not the show. The players are the show. You come to practice, you’ll see a whole lot more,” Stoudamire said.
It’s one reason why Stoudamire says he wasn’t nervous Thursday even though he was coming home. Much of the game is won and lost in practice.
“It’s easy to coach, from the standpoint of you just standing on the sidelines. You don’t really have a say in the game. It’s just barking commands, that’s all it is,” Stoudamire said.
Stoudamire says his players know of him through this thing called Google. On the recruiting trail, his name still has resonates to a degree, but in the end, it comes down to what Pacific can do for the player. The recruiting game is also a little different than Stoudamire’s days at Wilson, when big-name schools were trying to win him over.
“When I was growing up, you could tell the truth. I’m not saying you don’t tell the truth now, but sometimes you got to bend it,” Stoudamire said.
Pacific, which lost to Portland in the WCC opener in Stockton, avenged that 80-76 loss after taking over midway through the first half of Thursday’s game.
Portland sophomore Xavier Hallinan, who previously had played a total of 28 minutes in three games, made his first start and gave the Pilots a lift, scoring 10 early points as the teams were tied at 22. But the Tigers spurted to take a 33-28 halftime lead, and completely took command early in the second half, running out to a 19-point lead with 11:16 left in the game.
Pacific forward Anthony Townes was dominant, with 18 points and 16 rebounds. The Pilots, who made just 17 of 48 shots and were outrebounded 43-29, were led by Jazz Johnson’s 23 points.
–Nick Daschel | ndaschel@oregonian.com | @nickdaschel
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