Who would\u2019ve thought that it would be the Utah Jazz entering this matchup on a hot streak and the Portland Trail Blazers riding their toughest stretch of the 2013-14 NBA season. [ad-4468020]<\/p>\n
Utah (19-34) @ Portland (36-18)<\/strong> ATS Matchup Insight<\/a> | CP Insider Gambling Preview<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n Despite being considered one of the biggest tankers this year, the Jazz are 3-1 in their last four, which includes a win over the defending champion Miami Heat. Portland, on the other hand, has lost three in a row for the first time all season, and has dropped seven of its last 10. <\/p>\n The Jazz will need a big performance to come away with a win on the road, but they have the clear momentum in this matchup, making it intriguing on a leaguewide level.<\/p>\n Despite riding a hot streak, the Utah Jazz have been awful on offense all season. They\u2019re 28th in the league in points per game (94.4), and they\u2019re just 20th in three-point percentage and 24th in field-goal percentage. Utah\u2019s plan of attack must include attacking the rim. This doesn\u2019t necessarily have to be with the bigs, as the Jazz don\u2019t get much offensive production from their post players. Trey Burke, Alec Burks and Gordon Hayward have a good chance of penetrating the middle against Portland\u2019s perimeter defense, which will require quick rotations\u2014something the Blazers haven\u2019t been good at thus far.<\/p>\n The Trail Blazers need to get back on track, and they need to get back to defeating inferior opponents when they have the chance.<\/p>\n Against Utah, expect the Blazers\u2019 defense to pick it up a notch. They struggled to contain the San Antonio Spurs in their last outing, and they\u2019re just 27th in the league in points allowed; but with the Jazz struggling to put the ball in the basket with any regularity, this game will be a good chance for Portland to hit its defensive stride.<\/p>\n Expect Portland to come out with a ton of energy. The problem is that they\u2019re missing LaMarcus Aldridge from their starting lineup, as well as Meyers Leonard and Joel Freeland from the bench. A lack of bigs could be problematic moving forward, but against the Jazz, expect Portland\u2019s perimeter presence to be the deciding factor.<\/p>\n Portland 107 \u2013 Utah 97<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Utah Jazz vs. Portland Trail Blazers NBA Betting Odds Who would\u2019ve thought that it would be the Utah Jazz entering this matchup on a hot streak and the Portland Trail Blazers riding their toughest stretch of the 2013-14 NBA season.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":68,"featured_media":67894,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[4220,9769,8911,30501,50143,1283,5751,39459,39460],"class_list":["post-72585","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-nba","tag-jazz","tag-jazz-vs-trail-blazers","tag-portland","tag-portland-trail-blazers","tag-trail-blazers","tag-utah","tag-utah-jazz","tag-utah-jazz-vs-portland-trail-blazers","tag-utah-vs-portland"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72585","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/68"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=72585"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72585\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":72587,"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72585\/revisions\/72587"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/67894"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=72585"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=72585"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=72585"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nFriday, Feb. 21 10:00 PM ET @ Moda Center<\/strong>
\nSpread: Portland -8.5\u00a0<\/strong>
\nO\/U: \u00a0202<\/strong>
\n [dfads params=’groups=63740&limit=1&return_javascript=0′]<\/strong><\/p>\nCheck out our in-house Handicapper!!! Buy Razor Ray’s NBA Picks!<\/a><\/strong><\/h3>\n
Utah<\/h3>\n
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\nThe goal against Portland will be to make one of two things happen. Utah either needs to pick up its defensive presence, as the Blazers are the No. 1 scoring offense in the NBA, or they need to pick up their offensive game. The Blazers\u2019 defense has been as bad as the Jazz\u2019s offense up to this point, making it a more realistic assumption that their offense will be what keeps them in it despite their troubles thus far.<\/p>\nPortland<\/h3>\n