Who ya got? Previewing Nuggets-Blazers

With only one second-round series yet to tip off, theScore NBA writers Joe Wolfond and Joseph Casciaro preview the Western Conference semifinal matchup between the No. 2 Denver Nuggets and the No. 3 Portland Trail Blazers.

Prediction

Casciaro: Nuggets in 7

First of all, this is going to be a really refreshing series. The Nuggets haven't made the conference finals in 10 years, the Blazers haven't been there since 2000, and these division rivals haven't met in the playoffs since 1986, when Denver eliminated Portland in a first-round series that featured Alex English, Clyde Drexler, Mychal Thompson, and Kiki Vandeweghe.

This should also be a very competitive, entertaining matchup between two teams that finished the regular season with top-seven offenses and whose four-game season series was decided by a total of six points (Denver won 3-1).

The Blazers have already defied the odds by advancing past the first round without Jusuf Nurkic, but the big man's absence will loom a lot larger against a team led by Nikola Jokic than it did against a Thunder squad anchored in the middle by a clearly hobbled Steven Adams. After dominating the Spurs to the tune of 23.1 points, 12.1 rebounds, 9.1 assists, and 1.3 steals on 49-33-88 shooting, the Joker should be able to pick apart a Blazers defense that will throw players like Enes Kanter, Zach Collins, and Meyers Leonard at him.

Damian Lillard and C.J. McCollum decimated the Thunder and will keep Portland in this series - as will three games at the raucous Moda Center - but the Nuggets are more balanced, are better defensively (especially with Nurkic out of the picture), and own home-court advantage. I'll take them to triumph in another Game 7 at Pepsi Center.

Wolfond: Blazers in 6

I'm also super excited for this series - for all the reasons you mentioned, and also because it will feature two of the league's most purely entertaining players in Lillard and Jokic. Both of these teams are really good, but they're also both flawed in ways that those two superstars, specifically, will be able to exploit. The outcome will likely hinge on which player can more comprehensively expose those weak points.

You already mentioned Portland's overmatched frontcourt, which will likely get manhandled by Jokic. As a team, the Blazers did a really nice job helping and protecting Kanter in the first round, but they won't be able to help off shooters nearly as aggressively in this series as they did against Oklahoma City's misfiring roster.

At the other end, Denver will have issues trying to contain Lillard in the pick-and-roll. Unlike the Blazers, who shield Kanter by dropping him back as far as possible, the Nuggets protect Jokic by having him hard-hedge or blitz the ball-handler, and then rely on the rest of the defense to rotate behind him. However, Lillard was unbothered by the Thunder's attempts to trap him in the first round, and OKC is longer and more physical at the point of attack than Denver is.

The Nuggets actually did a great job on Lillard in the regular season, holding him to just 52.8 percent true shooting and 24.4 percent usage, two of his lowest marks against any opponent. I expect him to improve on the 10-of-35 (28.6 percent) he shot from deep during the season series, but I imagine Denver will still consider it a win if Lillard uses less than a quarter of Portland's possessions.

The Blazers can turn that strategy in their favor, but doing so will depend on Kanter's ability to be a viable release valve and make plays in four-on-three situations, on McCollum's ability to shoulder a large chunk of Lillard's playmaking burden, and on guys like Al-Farouq Aminu and Moe Harkless being able to leverage defensive inattention into open threes and backdoor cuts. I'd be more skeptical if I hadn't just watched each of those guys do each of those things to a T in the first round.

The Nuggets deserve credit for outlasting a more experienced Spurs team, but the way they closed out the series didn't exactly inspire confidence. There's a chance they'll play with a bit more house-money calm now that they've survived their first big test, but I have more faith in the Blazers being the best versions of themselves. They've been playing with more connectedness, and have a bit more individual scoring pop.

This was a tough one to call. My head says Nuggets, but my heart says Blazers.

Series X-factor

Casciaro: Offensive rebounding

This is a matchup of the top two offensive-rebounding teams during the regular season. And even without Nurkic, the Trail Blazers managed to collect 29.9 percent of available offensive rebounds during their first-round series against the Thunder.

Considering the efficient offenses on both sides, if one of these elite rebounding teams gains an advantage on the boards and gives itself a bevy of multiple-shot possessions, it should be able to make its opponent pay. And in a matchup featuring two teams that were separated by such narrow margins all season - again, six points separated them over 192 minutes of basketball - an extra shot here and there will take on greater significance.

Of note here, Blazers coach Terry Stotts might trust his team to be more aggressive on the offensive boards, given that Portland also ranked sixth in transition defense during the regular season and is No. 1 during the playoffs so far. Denver, by contrast, ranked 25th and is 13th in the postseason.

Wolfond: Gary Harris

Against San Antonio, Harris answered a lot of the questions I had about Denver's wing corps going into the playoffs. He was outstanding in all the ways his team needed him to be.

For starters, Harris hit 46.7 percent of his threes, making the Spurs pay for sending double-teams at Jokic in the post. On the other end, his defense helped take Derrick White out of the series after White had spent parts of three games torching the rest of Denver's backcourt. And when the Spurs snuffed out the Nuggets' Jokic-centric actions in the middle of the floor, Harris was able to create off the dribble and get to the rim, where he converted 70 percent of his attempts. Overall, the Nuggets were 6.9 points per 100 possessions better with him on the floor - the team's second-biggest on/off differential behind Paul Millsap.

Harris is going to be vital again in this series, particularly on defense. One of his few weaknesses is being a bit undersized for his position, but Portland is a great matchup in that regard, as he's bigger than both of their best scorers. Still, trying to stop Lillard and McCollum will be a lot more difficult than guarding White, whose lack of a reliable jumper allowed Harris to stunt and dig without fear of reprisal.

Guarding Lillard, in particular, necessitates being laser-focused at all times. Harris has the length and quickness to make life difficult for the Blazers star, and he'll need to be up for the task, as the Nuggets don't have many other defensive options for that matchup.