NBA Odds – Jazz vs Nuggets Game 2

NBA playoff picks are back at BetOnline Sportsbook, and we’ll start off our week by trying to find the winner of the Game 2 conference quarterfinal clash between the #5 Utah Jazz and the #4 Denver Nuggets.

The Nuggets took Game 1 of this series by wearing down the Jazz in a very, very fast paced game. They’re now hefty -500 favorites to take down this series, and they’re the choices of the oddsmakers to capture Game 2 by a comfortable margin as well.

#5 Utah Jazz (53-30, 49-31-3 ATS) vs. #4 Denver Nuggets (54-29, 36-41-6 ATS)

Game Date/Time: Monday, April 19th, 10:30 ET
Game Location: Pepsi Arena, Denver, CO
TV/Radio Broadcast: TNT, Sirius

NBA Playoff Odds
Utah Jazz +6.5
Denver Nuggets -6.5
Game Total 212

There was good news and bad news if you were a Utah Jazz fan in Saturday night’s Game 1 loss. The good news is that F Carlos Boozer was back in action after being very questionable for the start of this series with his rib and oblique injuries.

The bad news is that C Mehmet Okur’s season is over. Okur only played 11 minutes before suffering the Achilles tendon injury that ended his 2009-10 campaign. He averaged 13.5 points and 7.1 rebounds per game this season and will be sorely missed.

Utah’s problem wasn’t generating points in Game 1. After all, Boozer scored 19 points and pulled down eight boards, while G Deron Williams did his part by scoring 26 points and dishing out 11 assists.

Those were two of the five Utah players that reached double digits in scoring on the night.

F Paul Millsap, who is expected to join the starting five with Okur out of the lineup, scored 15 points and recorded 10 rebounds to go along with three blocked shots.

Denver was just far too much to overcome offensively. F Carmelo Anthony shot a blistering 18/25 from the floor, totaling 42 points to go with his four boards and five assists without turning the ball over.

Six Nuggets scored in double digits, but one of them, G JR Smith, might be out of action in Game 2 with an ankle injury.

G Chauncey Billups wasn’t exactly off of his game, scoring 15 points and dishing out eight assists, but thanks to the large margin of victory and his foul troubles, G Ty Lawson played a lot of his minutes. The North Carolina Tar Heel scored 11 points in 22 minutes off the bench.

Denver shot 57.1 percent from the floor and 42.3 percent from beyond the arc, but the biggest discrepancy in the game was in the rebounding department, where the Nuggs were +11.

NBA Playoff Insider Tip: The Jazz are just 0-7-2 ATS in their L/9 NBA betting battles with the Nuggets.

After losing Okur and already being without Kirilenko is really going to cost the Jazz. As long as the Nuggets keep up their offensive intensity, they’re going to be a very, very tough team to knock out of these playoffs, especially if they get to continue playing at home.

In Game 2, our NBA playoff picks are on Denver to take a 2-0 series lead both SU & ATS.

My NBA Playoff Prediction: Denver by 14