Game 2 of the opening-round Western Conference clash between the No. 8 Minnesota Timberwolves and the No. 1 Houston Rockets is set for this Wednesday night in a 9:30 p.m. tip at the Toyota Center. TNT will carry the national broadcast.
Minnesota at Houston Game Overview
Minnesota won its final three regular-season games straight-up, but that was not enough to avoid an opening round matchup in the playoffs against the league’s top team. Give the Timberwolves credit for keeping things interesting to the end of Sunday’s 104-101 loss in Game 1. They easily covered as 11.5-point road underdogs to cover against the spread for the fifth game in a row. The total stayed UNDER 215.5 points, and it has remained UNDER in four of their last five games.
Also, credit the collective effort of Andrew Wiggins (18 points) and Derrick Rose (16 points) off the bench in Sunday’s loss, but Minnesota is going to have to get more production from Karl-Anthony Towns and Jimmy Butler to have a shot at beating the Rockets. Towns were held to eight points, and Butler scored 13 points while going 4-for-11 from the field. As the team’s top two scorers, they averaged a combined 43.6 points a game during the regular season.
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The Rockets came away with the SU win to open this series, but they hardly looked like the team that posted the best record in the NBA this season at 65-17. Houston has now failed to cover in seven of its last eight games, and the total has stayed UNDER in 10 of its last 12 games. This includes a 1-4 record ATS in its previous five home games with the total staying UNDER in four of those five games.
James Harden played to expectations in Game 1 with a game-high 44 points while going 15-for-26 from the field. He connected on seven of his 12 shots from three-point range. Center Clint Capela also turned in a solid performance with 24 points and 12 rebounds. Houston shot a respectable 47.0 percent from the field, but it was off-target on 37 of its 47 attempts from beyond the arc. During the regular season, the Rockets were the second-highest scoring team in the NBA with an average of 112.4 PPG.
Get more details: Minnesota at Houston NBA Match-Up
Minnesota at Houston Game Betting Trends
- The Timberwolves have gone 2-6 ATS in their last eight games against the Southwest Division and they are 7-16 ATS in their previous 23 road games. The total has stayed UNDER in their last four games against this division.
- The Rockets are 0-4 ATS in their last four games against the Northwest Division, and they have failed to cover in their last seven conference games. The total has stayed UNDER in seven of their previous nine games in the opening round of the playoffs.
- Head-to-head in this conference clash, the road team is 5-2 ATS in the last seven meetings, and the total has gone OVER in seven of the last ten meetings in Houston.
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