The Denver Nuggets head to Los Angeles to face the Lakers in a rematch of last week’s matchup in Denver. The Nuggets had one of their best all-around games of the year defeating the Golden State Warriors on Monday without Nikola Jokic, Jamal Murray and Christian Braun. Russell Westbrook, Michael Porter Jr. and a big helping of Aaron Gordon at center really made a difference. Of course that came after one of the worst losses of the year, to the Washington Wizards in Denver. So who knows what Denver squad will show up – but we do know that the Lakers will be taking them very seriously and will likely have star Luka Doncic back. Even without LeBron James, that motivated version of the Lake Show can cause a battered Denver some significant problems, so buckle up – this part of the road trip may come with some turbulence.
The Essentials
Who: Denver Nuggets (44-25) at Los Angeles Lakers (42-25)
When: 8:00PM MST
Where: Staples Center, City of Angels CA
How to watch/listen: Altitude TV (now on Comcast!), Altitude+, ESPN, Altitude Radio 92.5FM.
Rival blog: Silver Screen and Roll
Injury report: Aaron Gordon – probable (ankle), Nikola Jokic – questionable (elbow/ankle), Jamal Murray – questionable (ankle), Christian Braun – questionable (foot), Julian Strawther – out (knee), DaRon Holmes II – out (Achilles rehab); Luka Doncic – probable (ankle), Trey Jemison – questionable (illness), LeBron James – out (groin), Rui Hachimura – out (knee), Maxi Kleber – out (foot surgery)
The Three Things
The thing to watch for: Who is suiting up?
If Luka Doncic, Nikola Jokic, Jamal Murray and Christian Braun are all out, this will be a very different game than if they all play. Whether Denver will play better or worse without its stars than the Lakers might without theirs is a matter of opinion, but Denver already tried to lose to LA once in the past week when the Lakers were putting their B-team on the court and absolutely took it to Denver.
Denver’s reserves meanwhile throttled a very hot Golden State Warriors team on Monday, so maybe judging the effectiveness of the squads in March by who suits up isn’t the way to go. No matter who is in a Nuggets uniform they will need to compete as hard as the ones who played Golden State did to win against LA tonight – the effort from the prior Lakers game or the one against the Washington Wizards will not cut it.
The thing to remember: Denver doesn’t really play regular season revenge games
Life would be easier if they did, but they don’t really come out with a different intensity if the last game was close, never mind if they lost it. The Nuggets sort of play at their own pace and preferences until the playoffs, to the eternal chagrin of coach Michael Malone who would prefer to see blood on the court every game. Denver has had some time on the West Coast, and whether it was San Francisco nightlife or the Los Angeles version, fingers crossed that the Nuggets can shake that hangover early and get down to business against a team that takes them extremely seriously now that the unbeatable aura against LA looks to have waned.
The thing to bet: Under 232.5 (-115)
The Lakers and Nuggets put up 257 points in their last outing that didn’t have Luka on the court, but that’s an outlier. The two teams combined for over 225 points just twice in the prior 7 games, and 230 only in the last outing. Seems like a high figure when neither squad is likely to want to run any returning starters into the ground. I expect both squads to get over 100, but 116-apiece still doesn’t get to the over and that just seems optimistic to me. Take the under.
