That Three, Though—Dame Lillard and The Best Thing to Happen to Rip City Since 1977

Damian Lillard isn't a fan of showing emotion after a big shot. After each of his numerous game-winners this season, he walked off as though nothing happened, not wanting to get too high or too low during a long season. But after he hit the biggest shot of his career, a three-pointer at the buzzer to advance the Portland Trail Blazers past the Houston Rockets, he couldn't help himself. He grabbed the PA announcer's microphone and bellowed, "RIP CITY!" Not only will Lillard's shot go down as the single most memorable play of the first three rounds, it delivered on the hopes that a tortured fanbase placed in him.

Lillard's buzzer-beater gave the Blazers their first playoff series win since 2000, a year that lives in infamy among Portland's faithful, a reminder of their historic collapse against the Lakers in Game 7 of the Western Conference Finals. Since then, it's been nothing but disappointment for the franchise, from the Jail Blazers to the years of knee problems for Brandon Roy and Greg Oden to Raymond Felton. It was about time Blazers fans got something to get excited about without any caveats or asterisks, and Lillard delivered it in nine-tenths of a second.

The second and third rounds of the playoffs in both conferences fell mostly flat, turning the postseason into an extended slog of interminable blowouts, overblown officiating controversies, and an obligation to care about Donald Sterling. Even Lillard and the Blazers got flattened in the second round, outclassed at every level by the eventual Western Conference champion Spurs.

But, man. That first round. Nearly every game was a thriller. Five of the series went the distance, some with multiple overtimes. The best first-round series in NBA history remains the 2009 Eastern Conference tilt between the Bulls and the Celtics, but there has never been a more entertaining overall first round than this year's. And there wasn't a better series in that round than Blazers-Rockets. It had everything you could ever want out of playoff basketball: two monster games from LaMarcus Aldridge, Dwight Howard playing like Dwight Howard, the out-of-nowhere heroics of rookie Troy Daniels, and a slew of overtimes. The only thing missing was a Game 7. Lillard made sure of that. But while a Game 7 would have been ideal, nobody watching the series who's not a Rockets fan would trade Lillard's series-winner for anything.

That goes double for Blazers fans. When Lillard grabbed the microphone after his huge shot, he was hardly the loudest person at the Rose Garden. The sellout crowd in Portland was celebrating not only the greatest on-court moment in the history of the franchise, but an exorcism of years of falling short that made it so. For everyone else, it was just the high point of a first round that was the high point of several years of playoffs.

The High Post is VICE Sports' NBA collective and they will be sharing their favorite memories of the 2014 postseason. This was the first installment.