The smoke around this smoldering basketball team known as the Trail Blazers began to clear Thursday night, leaving all who gathered at the Rose Garden to gawk at the shiner on Ruben Patterson's left eye and begin wondering how this team would respond to its latest misdeed.

The initial returns were not good, as the Blazers appeared emotionally drained and lifeless from a week's worth of drama during a crucial 93-88 loss to the Utah Jazz.

With eight games remaining, the Blazers (46-28) are .004 percentage points ahead of Minnesota (47-29) for the fourth seed in the Western Conference and 11/2 games ahead of Utah (45-30), which sits in sixth place.