That's about the best I can come up with for the Portland Trail Blazers, who are here to play the Bulls Thursday after recently running off a 13-game winning streak and moving into contention in the Northwest Division, barely behind Denver and ahead of Utah.

The Trail Blazers, 19-13 after a 90-79 victory over the Timberwolves in Minnesota on Wednesday, were giving up slightly more points per game than they were scoring and were 29th in the league in rebounding, 30th in steals, 20th in blocks and 18th in free throws. And while 10 of their wins in the streak were at home, seven were against teams with winning records, including the Nuggets and Jazz twice each.

"We've had a bit of good fortune in our schedule," general manager Kevin Pritchard conceded. "But it's also a testament to the guys. We play the right way — we're unselfish. I thought we had the right culture this season: guys who care about playing the right way, playing hard, playing to win. You never know if it translates into playoffs, but it bodes well for the future."

And if some of that sounds familiar — changing the culture, work ethic, tough, hard-nosed coach — it should.

Pritchard said he monitored the Bulls' method in building the Trail Blazers.

"It's absolutely paramount to bring in the right people," he said. "I've talked to John (Paxson) a lot and they've been a model. They've done it through the draft, bringing in good guys who care about the team. I wanted to be around guys who enjoy the work, work hard and represent us well.

"We knew we had to change. I told Pax many times the way they've been doing it is a model for us."

Even as the Bulls struggle this year?

"I think they're a winning streak away from being in the thick of things," Pritchard said. "They'll have it. Everyone in the league knows it. They're young and talented. But you also have to be lucky.

"I was with the Spurs. It's a phenomenal organization. But you've got to be a little lucky in this business and (they) got a break in the draft. The Bulls are still a phenomenal team."

That remains to be seen as the Bulls try to pull out of their recent spiral from a slow start and firing of coach Scott Skiles.

Now it's Portland, the onetime Jail Blazers of the NBA who were a local and national embarrassment with players getting arrested regularly and generally acting up, that's at the burgeoning stage where the Bulls were two years ago. After an 0-9 start, those Bulls took the NBA by surprise, winning 11 of 12 at one stretch in January on the way to a 47-win season that turned heads around the league.

The Trail Blazers could also have what's known in the league as "Spurs luck" — Greg Oden, potentially their answer to Tim Duncan as a superstar big man, should be back next season after knee surgery.

"He's coming along fantastic," Pritchard said. "He'll do anything you ask. He's not going to play this year. We're taking the long-term approach. He wants to get healthy. We'll wait until he's 100 percent, not 98 or 99."

The Oden-less Blazers started the season 5-12 and were being counted out — not unlike the 2004-05 Bulls.

Coach Nate McMillan was doubting himself and whether he'd last. Before their winning streak began, they had lost nine of 10.

"I give them credit," Pritchard said. "They could have shut it down."

They didn't, in large part because McMillan is an unrelenting coach and in Brandon Roy he has a skilled young guard who is opening eyes. The 6-foot-6-inch Roy has become the star of the 2006 draft that ultimately binds the fates of the Bulls and Trail Blazers.

The Bulls had the No. 2 and No. 16 picks and Portland had No. 4 and No. 7, the latter obtained in a deal with Boston in which Celtics general manager Danny Ainge was lampooned for trading for Sebastian Telfair and Theo Ratliff.

It looked a lot better for Ainge when those two went to Minnesota in the Kevin Garnett deal.

The Bulls were in the driver's seat at No. 2 with a mandate to go for a big man. They never truly considered Roy. Adam Morrison went No. 3 to Charlotte, Shelden Williams went No. 5 to Atlanta and Minnesota took Roy with No. 6 and traded him for Randy Foye and cash. (Minnesota had been making mistakes for years before dealing Garnett.)

The Bulls were split between LaMarcus Aldridge and Tyrus Thomas. Many scouts viewed Aldridge as having too slight a frame to add muscle, so he wouldn't be strong enough to stand up to the demands of a front-court position and would be more of a perimeter player like Channing Frye, who comes off the bench for Portland.

The Bulls, criticized at the time for not taking chances on athletic players with a high ceiling, took a risk with Thomas, hoping he might be another Amare Stoudemire, who had slipped to No. 9 in his draft. It didn't seem like a mistake at the time, especially with Viktor Khryapa thrown in.

Plus they moved up to No. 13 to get Thabo Sefolosha, viewed as a prototype shooting guard. The Jazz and the Suns liked him and were trying to outmaneuver the Bulls to land him.

So it looked like a great Bulls draft at the time, sort of like adding Shawn Marion, Leandro Barbosa and Andrei Kirilenko.

But then Skiles soured on Khryapa and refused to use him, and eventually on Thomas as well, which was one of the reasons Skiles was let go. The Bulls, in fact, were burned a little too much trying to accommodate Skiles' coaching style, having let J.R. Smith and Tim Thomas go for nothing and agreeing to deal Tyson Chandler.

That's likely to change now, though each move seemed a good idea at the time and was hardly criticized.

Portland ended up with Aldridge, who can play out of the post and is more aggressive than anyone figured.

"We truly didn't know how good he'd become," Pritchard acknowledged.

The same could be said of Roy, based on his draft position. Now he's running the point at critical times and helped the Blazers win the fourth quarter 10 times in their 13-game streak.

"He's got a chance to be a special player," Pritchard said. "We want him to shoot more, but it's not his nature. He wants to be a team player. He has that special ability to make players around him better and he takes the responsibility on himself. We thought he was a good guy, but he's as solid as they come.

"The way we look at it is we're adding two first-round picks (Oden and Rudy Fernandez, who is playing overseas) to a good, young core and watching it grow. We're enjoying the experience without looking too far into the future."