NBA Betting – Houston Rockets at Portland Trail Blazers
By Zack Garrison in News
Updated: January 17, 2018 at 9:40 am ESTPublished:
Houston Rockets at Portland Trail Blazers (-2.5, 207 o/u)
Tonight (10:30 p.m. Eastern at the Moda Center), the Portland Trail Blazers (41-20, 26-6 home) will host the Houston Rockets (43-20, 19-11 away) in their second game since losing small forward Wesley Matthews to a season-ending injury.
The Blazers have one of the best home records in the NBA (26-6) mark, but the injury to Matthews puts a huge dent on their playoff and title hopes. Matthews is the team’s third-leading scorer and an integral part of its top-ten defense. He was lost for the season on Thursday after suffering a tear in his Achilles tendon.
“I probably talk to him [Matthews] more than anybody, so it’s definitely different,” said Blazers power forward LaMarcus Aldridge. “But we’ve got guys out there that can go compete still.”
In their first game without the Marquette product, the Blazers lost to the lowly Minnesota Timberwolves, 121-113, giving up nearly 25 points more than their season average.
Even the T-Wolves players were commenting on Matthews’ absence. “[Matthews] does it all. He can defend, he can post up, he can knock down the open three,” Minnesota’s Gary Neal told the AP after the game. “They’re definitely going to miss him.”
The Rockets will be making their first trip to Portland since being ousted from last year’s playoffs on a buzzer beater by Blazers point guard Damian Lillard. But tonight’s game will be the third time these teams have met this year, having already split two games in Houston.
Houston has bumped Portland down a notch in the standings, recently surpassing the Blazers for third in the Western Conference thanks to a 7-2 spurt in its last ten games. Portland remains seven games up on OKC for top spot in the Northwest Division.
The Blazers are 2.5-point favorites for tonight’s game and the total is at 207.
Trends: Houston has covered the spread in three of the last four head-to-head.
With James Harden playing MVP ball for the Rockets and the Blazers still trying to figure out life sans Matthews, taking Houston (+2.5) to cover again looks like the better play.
(Photo credit: Basket Streaming (flickr) [https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/legalcode]. Photo has been cropped.)
Sports Writer
Zack is a tour guide whose favorite sports are football, baseball, and golf. He enjoys giving obnoxious commentary during games and hopes to some day write a book about sports. His favorite underdog victory was the Diamondbacks beating the Yankees in game 7 of the World Series.
