{"id":22535,"date":"2012-03-29T10:02:49","date_gmt":"2012-03-29T15:02:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/?p=22535"},"modified":"2012-03-29T10:02:49","modified_gmt":"2012-03-29T15:02:49","slug":"kobe-bryant-los-angeles-lakers-guard-takes-on-the-oklahoma-city-thunder","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/kobe-bryant-los-angeles-lakers-guard-takes-on-the-oklahoma-city-thunder-22535\/","title":{"rendered":"Kobe Bryant: Los Angeles Lakers Guard Takes On the Oklahoma City Thunder"},"content":{"rendered":"

Oklahoma City Thunder at Los Angeles Lakers
\nThursday, 3\/29\/12, 10:30 PM EST, TV:\u00a0 TNT
\nOpening Point Spread:\u00a0 Oklahoma City PK
\nCurrent Betting Line:\u00a0 Oklahoma City -1
\nOpening Total:\u00a0 201
\nCurrent Total:\u00a0 200.5
\nOdds Courtesy of Bookmaker<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"Lakers<\/a>
Los Angeles Lakers G Kobe Bryant will face off against former teammate Derek Fisher Thursday night inside the Staples Center<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Oklahoma City has the best record in the Western Conference and has won four games in a row entering tonight\u2019s contest against the Los Angeles Lakers inside the Staples Center.\u00a0 The Thunder have covered three of those four wins, including a dominating 109-95 victory over the Portland Trail Blazers as 4.5-point road favorites on Tuesday night.\u00a0 Offensively, the team shot 57.0 percent from the floor, as All-Star point guard Russell Westbrook led the way with 32 points and eight assists.\u00a0 Oklahoma City is 8-7 ATS in March and the \u201cover\u201d is 9-6 in that situation.<\/p>\n

The Thunder are 16-8 overall on the road this season, including a 12-6 mark versus Western Conference opponents.\u00a0 Oklahoma City captured a 100-85 win over Los Angeles in the first meeting this season as seven-point home favorites, while going \u201cunder\u201d the posted total of 195.5.\u00a0 Total players will find that the \u201cunder\u201d has cashed in four of the last five meetings overall.\u00a0 Tonight\u2019s game also signals the return of Derek Fisher to Los Angeles since being traded by the franchise, as he has missed 17 of 22 shots since being signed by Oklahoma City.<\/p>\n

Los Angeles has won three of four games, but not everything is rosy in Laker Land as the team begins a four-game homestand.\u00a0 Lakers first-year head coach Mike Brown has\u00a0 tried to get a hold of his team by benching guard Kobe Bryant and center Andrew Bynum over the last two games.\u00a0 He was upset at Bynum for taking an ill-advised three-point shot in a 104-101 win over the Golden State Warriors last time out.\u00a0 \u201cThat\u2019s something that I felt could\u2019ve taken us out of rhythm,\u201d stated Brown after the game.\u00a0 Los Angeles is 6-10 ATS when revenging a loss against an opponent.<\/p>\n

The Lakers still have another offensive threat in forward Pau Gasol on the floor, who is coming off a 19-point and 17-rebound performance.\u00a0 He came into the contest averaging 16.8 points and 10.4 rebounds on the season.\u00a0 Los Angeles is 20-4 at home this season, including a 14-2 mark versus Western Conference foes.\u00a0 Including last season, the franchise has taken six straight season series from Oklahoma City.<\/p>\n

Bettors will likely back the Thunder due to their 4-0 ATS mark versus Pacific division opponents, while the Lakers are 0-5 ATS in their last five home games.<\/p>\n

Don\u2019t miss out on a winning season and let the NBA handicappers at Maddux Sports line your pockets with cash.\u00a0 Long term packages are available now!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Oklahoma City Thunder at Los Angeles Lakers Thursday, 3\/29\/12, 10:30 PM EST, TV:\u00a0 TNT Opening Point Spread:\u00a0 Oklahoma City PK Current Betting Line:\u00a0 Oklahoma City -1 Opening Total:\u00a0 201 Current Total:\u00a0 200.5 Odds Courtesy of Bookmaker Oklahoma City has the best record in the Western Conference and has won four games in a row entering […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":181,"featured_media":3934,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1444,133],"tags":[67,68,18,399,3298,3624,3693],"class_list":["post-22535","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-headlines","category-nba-handicapping","tag-kobe-bryant","tag-los-angeles-lakers","tag-nba","tag-oklahoma-city-thunder","tag-russell-westbrook","tag-staples-center","tag-western-conference"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22535","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/181"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22535"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22535\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":22536,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22535\/revisions\/22536"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3934"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22535"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22535"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22535"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}