Portland Trail Blazers vs Cleveland Cavaliers preview and teams – 2013 NBA Week 8

Wednesday’s first NBA Week 8 match is between Portland Trail Blazers and Cleveland Cavaliers. The opening tip-off is set to commence at 11:10am with the game to be played at Quicken Loans Arena. The away team Portland Trail Blazers are the favourites for the match. View our preview and teams for the game between Portland Trail Blazers and Cleveland Cavaliers.

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When: 11:10 | Wednesday 18/12/2013

Where: Quicken Loans Arena, Cleveland, OH

Portland Trail Blazers $1.52 vs Cleveland Cavaliers $2.61 at Sportsbet Australia get a $250 FREE BET on this match

Portland Trail Blazers $1.53 vs Cleveland Cavaliers $2.55 at Luxbet Australia get a $500 FREE BET on this match

Odds Comparison:

Portland Trail Blazers 1.52 1.56 1.53 1.56 1.52 1.51
Cleveland Cavaliers 2.61 2.50 2.55 2.50 2.61 2.57

Teams:

Portland Trail Blazers

Portland Trail Blazers logo
Num Player
12 LaMarcus Aldridge
5 Will Barton
88 Nicolas Batum
18 Victor Claver
23 Allen Crabbe
19 Joel Freeland
11 Meyers Leonard
0 Damian Lillard
42 Robin Lopez
2 Wesley Matthews
3 C.J. McCollum
41 Thomas Robinson
17 Earl Watson
25 Mo Williams
1 Dorell Wright

Cleveland Cavaliers:

Cleveland Cavaliers logo
Num Player
15 Anthony Bennett
21 Andrew Bynum
6 Earl Clark
9 Matthew Dellavedova
30 Carrick Felix
33 Alonzo Gee
2 Kyrie Irving
1 Jarrett Jack
10 Sergey Karasev
0 C.J. Miles
14 Henry Sims
13 Tristan Thompson
17 Anderson Varejao
3 Dion Waiters
40 Tyler Zeller

Preview:

Following an impressive home debut with his new team, Rudy Gay must leave northern California for a while but has the Sacramento Kings feeling real good going to the road.

Gay looks to stay hot as Sacramento plays four road games in five nights, starting Tuesday night against the stumbling Charlotte Bobcats.

“The basketball is going to be in my hands a lot,” Gay said, “so I’m just trying to keep everybody comfortable and keep everybody happy.”

Gay, acquired from Toronto in a seven-player deal last Monday, takes some pressure off Kings top scorers DeMarcus Cousins and Isaiah Thomas. Gay had 24 points on 8-of-12 shooting in his Sacramento debut, a 116-107 loss at Phoenix on Friday, then scored 26 in a 106-91 win over Houston on Sunday and left to a standing ovation from his new home fans.

“It makes the game so much easier,” said Cousins, who had 21 points and 10 rebounds. “It’s not such a heavy load on me and Isaiah every night, just having another go-to guy.”

Thomas added 19 points for Sacramento (7-15), which held the lead for most of the final 35 minutes. Thomas, Cousins and Gay all made at least half of their field-goal attempts and combined for 17 assists. Gay chipped in five rebounds and four steals.

“It makes my job easier on offense. That’s for sure,” coach Michael Malone said of adding Gay, who averaged 19.4 points for the Raptors. “He’s so skilled. He’s so talented. He makes it look so easy out there. He can score in so many ways.”

Malone also was pleased to see his team hold the Rockets, among the league’s highest-scoring teams, to their second-lowest point total of the season on 41.3 percent shooting. The Kings allowed an average of 107.9 points in their other seven games this month.

Only once have they held an opponent below 100 away from home. They’ve played a league-low seven road games, going 2-5, but they’ll follow this matchup with Wednesday’s trip to Atlanta before visiting Miami on Friday and Orlando on Saturday.

Cousins has recorded double-doubles in all three of his games in Charlotte (10-14) and enters this contest having posted a season-high four straight.

Gay has averaged 24.3 points in three games against the Bobcats in 2013.

Charlotte has lost the last three meetings with Sacramento, held to 88.0 points per game on 41.2 percent shooting, and has been similarly mediocre offensively during its current three-game losing streak. The Bobcats averaged 87.3 points and shot 42.6 percent, including 10 of 42 from 3-point range.

All three games were decided by single digits, and Charlotte had a fourth-quarter lead in the last two against Indiana and the Lakers.

“We’ve played a few games now where it’s come down to the end, especially against good teams, and just haven’t been able to come up with the plays,” guard Gerald Henderson said. “… We need to be more consistent down the stretch of games at both ends. That goes for everybody, myself included.”

Henderson has scored in double figures in 15 straight games and Kemba Walker has done so in 13 in a row, including a game-high 24 points in Sunday’s 88-85 home loss to Los Angeles.

Walker has averaged 12.7 points on 35.0 percent shooting, including 2 of 16 from beyond the arc, in three meetings with Charlotte

Source: www.nba.com

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