NBA NW: Nuggets Aim for 8th Straight Win
After a thrilling day of NBA basketball on Friday that saw the Miami Heat extend their incredible win streak to 17 games, Saturday will serve up another hefty slate of NBA battles and one of them will feature the league’s second hottest team, the Denver Nuggets.
The Nuggets have spent much of the last two months slowly climbing their way up the Western Conference standings thanks to a couple of impressive win streaks. During their current run, they’ve continued to tear up the offensive side of the floor and will be entering tonight’s contest against the Minnesota Timberwolves with the third best scoring offense in the league (102.4 PPG).
The Nuggets will also have the home crowd on their side at the Pepsi Center and those rowdy fans will give Denver plenty of support, as they have during the Nuggets’ other amazing run of 12 straight home wins. They’ll enter tonight’s game with a near flawless 27-3 home mark.
However, one thing the Timberwolves do have going for them is that they accounted for one of those three losses earlier this season. Surprisingly enough, the T-Wolves have gotten the better of Denver so far this season, winning two out of the three previous meetings.
This time the Wolves may have a rougher go against Denver though. Not only are the Nuggets playing their best ball of the season, but Minnesota will be without Kevin Love, Andrei Kirilenko and Nikola Pekovic, who are all out with injuries. Since Love left the lineup with a broken hand, Minnesota hasn’t mustered many wins, especially on the road, where the Wolves have dropped 12 of their last 13 without their star forward. So, taking one away from Denver in one of the NBA’s most hostile environments without Love will certainly be a tall order.
However, when looking at the spread it’s hard to like the Nuggets here. They are getting a massive 14.5 points today against the Wolves. All things considered, there’s little doubt that they’ll earn the win, but to beat any NBA team by 15 takes quite an effort. The Wolves have played poorly lately, but they aren’t a team that gets blown out that often. Take Minnesota to cover the +14.5 spread in a loss tonight.
Continue to keep your eye on the Nuggets down the stretch. They are a team I liked as a dark horse pick in the West a few weeks ago, but with the way they are playing, they may very well be a legitimate contender to take down the Thunder, Spurs and Clippers, the latter of which Denver just beat the other night.
