The Portland Trail Blazers' playoff-clinching win over the Brooklyn Nets on Monday night was marred by a horrific injury to center Jusuf Nurkic's lower left leg in the second and final overtime -- compound fractures to his tibia and fibula, ending his season.
The injury came at an especially bad time for the Blazers and Nurkic, who was enjoying the best season of his five-year NBA career and had missed just one game due to injury. Nurkic's 15.4 points per game had been Portland's third-highest average behind the high-scoring backcourt of Damian Lillard and CJ McCollum, while his 10.3 rebounds and 1.4 blocks per game led the Blazers and he was also second at 3.2 assists a night.
How will his absence affect Portland's chances of maintaining home-court advantage in the first round of the Western Conference playoffs and winning a postseason series for the first time in three years?