NBA - Denver Nuggets v NJ Nets

24 November 2009

Preview By Tipster Jumbo (New Zealand)

The Nuggets are unbeaten in the last 8 and a half months in regular season games at the Pepsi Center and will try to extend that today against the Nets, Denver is undefeated in 15 games at the Pepsi Center since March 9 last season and are looking to improve to 6-0 at home to begin their season , Coming off a 106-99 road loss to the Clippers they bounced back with a 112-93 victory over the Bulls on Saturday after looking dead and buried at one point in that game, but a strong 3rd Quarter got them back on track while the Bulls fell away badly, The Nuggets are getting a lot from Mello and Smith after he returned from a suspension 3 games ago now, Mello is the Leagues leading scorer at 30.5 points per game, and has been shooting at 58.8 percent from the field in his last four games, While JR Smith is shooting at 43.7 percent, He scored 12 of his 19 points in the fourth quarter Saturday, hitting two 3s in the period.

The Nets are only 4 games away from tying for the NBA’s worst start and things are not looking good at all in many ways, The Nets lost 98-91 to the Hapless Knicks in their last match on Saturday, and have now lost 12 in a row for the first time since a 14-game slide in 1990. They got back point guard Harris , which is good for them, Harris came off the bench and contributed 12 points and seven assists., Bad news if he doesn’t play for the Nets though is that Brooks Lopez went down at Practice the other day with a sprained ankle and is doubtful for the Nets today, which is not good as he has really been good for the Nets in their opening games, the last time the Nets played the Nuggets they fell to 5-0, losing 122-94 on Nov. 4 at Home, Denver trailed at halftime but outscored New Jersey 44-26 in the third quarter to take the win., The Nets have a few injury problems though even with Harris back and perhaps Lopez also in missing today, No Battie, Dooling, Hayes, Najera and Jianlian for the Nets with Lee and Lopez struggling with knocks could really count against the Nets in this game today, especially in the big man department.

The Nuggets are 9-4 on the season and are 4-1 ATS in 5 matches at the Pepsi Center, Against the Nets and the Nuggets are 5-5 in their last 10 against the Nets and are also 5-5 ATS in those matches, At the Pepsi Center in Denver the Nuggets have won 3 of their last 4 against the Nets and are 2-2 ATS in those most recent matches, However the Nuggets in their last 6 against the Nets are 5-1 ATS and of the 5 games they have won their average wining margin has been 17 Points.

Other reasons I fancy this bet are that the Nuggets are shooting at 47% to open this season while the Nets are hitting at 40% from the Field, The Nuggets make almost 3 more 3 Point shots than the Nets do in games so far this season and are actually doing well with their Free-throw shooting this season hitting at 80% compared to the Nets 78%, that is actually an Improvement for the Nuggets based on their last couple of seasons efforts from the Charity Stripe, On the season the Nuggets score more than 22 points more per game than the Nets, but allow 5 points more than the Nets have this season.

Usually I wouldn’t touch a start as big as this and a lot of times I would expect a side on a losing streak to eventually play well and win a game, but normally I would follow that if the losing side was at home, but today the Nets aren’t at home now are they, the Nuggets have come from behind or given away leads only to come back and win games in quite a few games this season and I get the feeling that they are due to win a game well from the outset, If Lopez is out for the Nets today then even with Harris back the Nets could find the going tough, Lopez has really been the Nets only bright spot in their bad start to the season and if he is out or only has limited game time the Nuggets Big men could have a field day especially the way they are playing right now, Talent wise the Nuggets are by far the better side and as they are at home I’m going to back them to show us why the rest of the Western Conference should be very wary of them…..Good Luck.