NBA Picks: Utah Jazz at Los Angeles Lakers
Written by Steve Janus - Google +
The Utah Jazz will look to avoid losing five straight on the road when they visit the Los Angeles Lakers Tuesday night at the Staples Center. That doesn’t figure to be an easy task for the Jazz, as they have lost 16 straight at Los Angeles.
Utah is 0-4 on their current road trip, with only one loss to a team with a winning record, a 110-86 beating by the Celtics last Friday. Utah’s most recent loss came at the hands of the Philadelphia 76ers, as they downed the Jazz 96-85.Utah has been outscored by 50 points during the road skid.
The Lakers have alternated a loss with a win, since rolling off seven straight. The Lakers most recent performance was pretty impressive, as they went into Denver and beat the Nuggets 107-97. Los Angeles will be looking to avenge a 102-96 loss at Utah earlier this season.
Taking a look at the NBA spreads for tonight’s game, oddsmakers have the Lakers favored by 7.5-points over the Jazz with the total sitting at 195.5.
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It is going to take one heck of an effort from the Jazz to win this game, and it all starts with point guard Deron Williams, who had 29 points and 12 assists in the first meeting against the Lakers. Williams bounced back from a five point and six assists performance against the Celtics with 20 points and 14 assists against the 76ers.
Against the 76ers Al Jefferson had 19 points and 13 rebounds, Paul Millsap scored 18 and grabbed 12 boards, and Andrei Kirilenko had 12 points off the bench. No other player scored more than six points for the Jazz, including C.J. Miles, who had just six points. Utah is 14-1 when Miles scores at least 14 points.
The Lakers got a great team effort in their latest win over the Nuggets. Pau Gasol and Ron Artest scored 19 a piece, Kobe Bryant and Lamar Odom each had 18, and Andrew Bynum chipped in with 17 points in just 27 minutes. Los Angeles as a team shot 53% from the field, despite going just 4-16 from three-point range.
Bryant had 31 points in the first meeting against the Jazz, and Gasol added 21 points and 11 rebounds. The Lakers opened up with a 33-17 first quarter lead, but were outscored in each of the final three periods. The Lakers didn’t have Bynum back from injury at the time of the first meeting, and with Odom in the starting lineup, Los Angeles got just 13 points from their bench.
With the way the Lakers have dominated the Jazz, and as bad as Utah has looked on their current road trip, I think you have to roll the dice on the Lakers to not only win this game, but cover the spread as well. Los Angeles is winning by an average of 12.4 points during their 16 game streak at home against the Jazz.
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