Nuggets at Lakers
The Denver Nuggets will try for their fourth consecutive victory when they host the Los Angeles Lakers on Sunday night. The Nuggets began their longest winning streak of last season - seven games - in late November as well, and will be trying to win seven straight against the Lakers overall. Los Angeles had a two-game winning streak going before they were blown out by the Dallas Mavericks on Friday night.
Kobe Bryant has moved back ahead of LeBron James as the NBA scoring leader at 26.7 points a game. His shot totals are at their highest since 2005-06 and his field-goal percentage, which has never been under 40 percent for a full season, sits at 37.8 after he combined to shoot 16-for-50 in the last two games. Bryant hasn’t faced the Nuggets since February 2013, when his fellow starters were Dwight Howard, Steve Nash, Metta World Peace and Earl Clark.
TV: 9:30 p.m. ET, Altitude (Denver) TW SportsNet (Los Angeles)
ABOUT THE NUGGETS (5-7): Wilson Chandler is coming off his best two-game stretch of the season and that’s a good sign for Denver as it tries to get back to .500. He scored a season-high 21 in Wednesday’s win against the Oklahoma City Thunder and produced his next-highest scoring game two nights later with 18 points in a victory against the New Orleans Pelicans. He’s a combined 15-for-26 shooting in those performances, including 6-for-10 from 3-point land.
ABOUT THE LAKERS (3-10): Jeremy Lin continued his wild inconsistency Friday night, scoring 18 points on 8-for-11 shooting. That followed his 1-for-5 performance against the Houston Rockets on Wednesday, and he missed his only two field-goal attempts against the Golden State Warriors three days before that. In between those duds, he shot 6-for-7 and scored 15 points with 10 assists in a road win against the Atlanta Hawks.
BUZZER BEATERS
1. The Lakers are allowing a league-high 112.5 points a game, 6.9 more than the Nuggets, who allow the fifth-most.
2. The Lakers have 16 losses of at least 20 points in the last two years, compared to 15 over the previous seven seasons.
3. Nuggets G Randy Foye has combined for 28 points in the five games since he scored 28 against the Cleveland Cavaliers on November 7.
PREDICTION: Nuggets 128, Lakers 116