This matchup favours Orlando in ridiculous ways. Although Denver beat Miami easily, they gave up way too many easy boards and never even looked like wanting to control the game on D. It was just shoot-shoot-shoot, and it worked. Denver cannot play defense, and that's hardly a secret... This is obviously not a good sign if you're going into Orlando to face Dwight Howard. Expect huge numbers out of him. When you have as many pure shooters as Orlando has aswell, you pretty much have Denver's worst nightmare!
I'm thinking it'll be comfortable, even without Nelson. Turkoglu and Howard will have the potential to pile on the points against Denver's sub-par defence tonight. They have a lot of offensive versatility, and are an impressive 18-6 ATS vs. teams who give up 100+ PPG this season.
Denver are getting by solely on their potent offense, and Orlando are the achilles to their style of play. Could be ugly by the end of the 1st...