evolved enough? Fans were

fearful of

being duped

I saw Trail Blazers fans take a peek when they entered the Rose Garden on Tuesday. Just to be sure, they looked at the scoreboard. And they stared at the giant statistical display at one end of the arena. And they saw zeroes everywhere.

They made sure this really was a fresh start.

We've been told that Portland is the nation's most depressing city. We get divorced. We use antidepressants. It rains here, too. So never mind all that, the Blazers won a playoff game.

So belly-bump your boss today.

The Blazers beat the Houston Rockets 107-103. Their Western Conference best-of-seven playoff series is tied 1-1. And never mind that the Blazers had to expend every ounce of energy to get a win. What we have here is hope, and goose bumps, and now the mission isn't avoiding disaster, but rather, trying to steal a single game in Texas so this series might be tipped back Portland's way.

Prior to Game 1 on Saturday, the arena felt electric. The cheers were tight. The chants were overdone. You'd waited six years for this playoff series. You took a leap, and you woke up flat on your back. And so on Tuesday in the run-up to Game 2, while fans inside the Rose Garden were brewing with quiet enthusiasm, they were noticeably reserved and fearful of being duped.

You know, sort of how Charlie Brown should have been when making that second run to kick that football out of Lucy's hands.

People are going to spend the next few days dissecting the differences between games 1 and 2 of the series. And maybe that's natural. But what's more important is to recognize how Houston responded when it was pressed, and squeezed, and forced to make decisions with the outcome of a game undecided.

The Rockets got rattled.

And Portland caused that.

The Blazers' ability to continue to apply pressure, and make Houston feel the gravity of the moment, is the key to the rest of this series. Remember, with the home court and playoff seeding at stake, Dallas took it to the Rockets in the regular-season finale, and Houston wilted in the big moment.

For all the problems the Blazers have had matching up with Houston this season, they were able to do what good postseason teams do --adjust.

Credit to coach Nate McMillan, who ran plays for his best two players, and also, threw a wrinkle at the Rockets by playing 7-footers Greg Oden and Joel Przybilla together.

Brandon Roy had 42 points. And LaMarcus Aldridge had 27. And there was Rudy Fernandez with those final two free throws that locked this one up.

Those who have watched Houston all season will tell you that the Rockets are big and strong, but plagued with inconsistency. They'll tell you Ron Artest has the ability to wow, or wilt, depending on the situation. They'll tell you that the single most important key for Portland is for the Blazers to be relentless with the pressure, and make the Rockets feel the stakes.

Houston didn't look like the older, more experienced team in the final five minutes on Tuesday. And maybe you expected the Blazers would show mettle because they did just that in big games after being battered by the Lakers and Celtics this season.

The pressure now isn't on the league's youngest playoff team. Nope. It's on the Rockets, who are without Tracy McGrady and haven't been out of the first round of the playoffs since Yao Ming arrived.

The Ming Dynasty?

It's been marked with high hopes and big dreams, and with a billion Chinese watching a 7-foot-6 Basketball player participate in what has been a series of disappointing first-round playoff exits. Yao isn't alone. Coach Rick Adelman has lived through it, too. The Blazers need to remind Houston of their propensity for failure with every big possession, and with every defensive stop.

Portland won a playoff game. The series is tied. But the cold, hard truth is that the Blazers had to scratch, fight and expend an incredible amount of energy in scraping out that first victory.

You can't be certain the Blazers have three more of these games in them, but you'd have a difficult time finding a Blazers fan today who doesn't believe. And that's the magic of postseason Basketball because what we're witnessing is a franchise attempting to discover if it has evolved to the point where it might win a series.

The frenzy in the final minutes of Game 2 was overdue. It was an uplifting day in a delighted city. It even rained Tuesday.

Confetti, that is.

John Canzano: 503-294-5065;

JohnCanzano@aol.com

Read his blog at

oregonlive.com/canzano.

Catch him on the radio on

The Bald-Faced Truth, 3-6 p.m.

weekdays on KXTG (95.5).