... in Blazers history, that is. If they win tonight's contest in Houston (6 p.m. our time), the youthful Blazers will square their series with the Rockets and turn it into a three-game dogfight in which Portland will have home court advantage. If they lose, they're one game away from being eliminated, and the Rockets will get three chances to pull the plug on them.

Friday night's loss highlighted the shortcomings of this year's Portland team. It was a game that they could have stolen, but they fell short. They made some bad decisions along the way. Their game plan was thin. They lived by the jump shot, and therefore left themselves vulnerable to die by it. They kept handing the ball to Brandon Roy and getting out of the way, on a night when he had his hands full and there were others on the team who could have produced more. They fell down on defense too many times.

The list could go on, but tonight has to be the night when we make up the list of all the good things that rock Houston and send the war back to the Rose City even-Steven. The national TV announcers told us the other night that the team that wins Game 3 and goes ahead 2 to 1 wins the series 76% of the time. Nobody said it was gonna be easy. Bu hao, Yao!