2009 NBA Playoffs: Western Conference Semifinals

Since the Eastern Conference is still utterly undecided, I'll start off with the predictions for the Western conference today and follow up with Eastern Conference picks on Sunday night when Miami plays Atlanta in their game 7. That being said, Boston-Chicago has been epic, and I've been lucky to have caught every single game, and each one has been an instant classic. Could not ask for more in any series.

With that, let's get to the West semifinals picks.

#1 Los Angeles 65-17
#5 Houston 53-29
LA won the season series 4-0

It makes me very sad that LA didn't manage to close out Utah in 4 as I predicted. Despite giving up numerous leads and allowing Utah to make large runs at the end of games, Utah barely managed to beat LA at home by 2, with Kobe Bryant having one of the worst shooting games of his playoff career. Luckily, Houston made up for it by beating Portland in six as predicted. Houston did exactly what I predicted: Steal one of the first two games against the inexperienced Portland, then ride home court to the series win. That being said, this Houston team has now run out of time. Houston had the advantage of playing against one of the league's slowest offenses in Portland, allowing Houston's lock-down individual defense to set itself on almost every possession and utterly shut-down the Blazers potent offense. Meanwhile, the Lakers simply overpowered the Jazz, who could not score nearly enough points to keep up.

Expect LA to get out and run on every chance it gets, repeatedly beating Yao Ming down the court for easy dunks and layups. Also, don't expect Yao Ming to be as unstoppable against the Lakers, as LA is a much more practiced help defense team than Portland. There are advantages all over the court for LA: Scola cannot guard Odom or Gasol, Yao cannot keep up with Bynum or Gasol, and Kobe absolutely loves torching Artest. Similar to the Utah series, I just can't see how the Rockets will keep up against LA purely in terms of scoring.

One thing that cannot be underestimed is the Lakers closing lineup of Fisher, Bryant, Ariza, Odom, and Gasol. With that lineup, Yao cannot guard either Odom or Gasol, so forcing him into the Kobe Gasol Pick-and-Roll will be a nightmare for Houston defensively. On the other side, Houston simply doesn't have a go to scorer if Yao is being doubled hard and the easy passing lanes are being cut off. Oh, and LA also has that guy named Bryant. He's pretty good from what I've heard.
Prediction: LA in 4

#2 Denver 54-28
#6 Dallas 50-32
Denver won the season series 4-0

Both of these teams truly surprised. I did not think that Denver had the defensive prowess to contain Chris Paul, but Dahntay Jones and many others did an excellent job of shutting him down. I also wasn't sure if Dallas could defend a motivated San Antonio, but San Antonio helped them by not having anyone who could score other than Parker and Duncan. Overall, this series is extremely tough to gauge. The teams match-up extremely well, and I really think this series comes down to who can shoot the ball better. Between Dirk Nowitski, Jason Terry, Chauncey Billups, Carmelo Anthony, and JR Smith, this series will feature mostly long bombs and probably very few interior plays. This series hinges on the guard matchups between Billups and Jason Kidd and Jason Terry and JR Smith, where Kidd will be able to guard the relatively slow Billups (at least compared to Chris Paul), and Billups will have to respect Kidd's three point shot and rebounding ability. Between Smith and Terry, it comes down to who plays less defense. Both of these guys can bomb away, but whoever contests better will win the day. Since both these teams are prototypical great at home, .500 on the road teams, and the teams are so evenly matched, I have to go with the homecourt.
Prediction: Denver in 7