Three of the Eastern Conference's top four teams are on winning streaks of four games or more, and that includes the Washington wizards. That has made things very interesting as they are just two games behind the top seed, and it would be very important to grab home court advantage against some of the beasts in the East. After thumping the Lakers, the Wizards stay in LA to matchup with the Clippers on Wednesday night. Tipoff is set for 10:30 PM Eastern time and the game will be shown on CSN Mid-Atlantic and Prime Ticket.
Wizards (46-28, 1st Southeast)
Washington has taken advantage like most teams have recently and whooped up on Cleveland 127-115 before staging a huge comeback over the Lakers, 119-108. The Wizards have been blazing with an average of 116.2 points in their past five games. Even more astonishing in that stretch: they've been putting up 32.8 points in the fourth quarter while holding opponents to 23 points in the same period.
Shooting guard Bradley Beal (23 ppg, 3.5 apg) put up a whopping 41 points on the Clippers the last time out. Point guard John Wall (23.2 ppg, 10.8 apg) has recorded three double-doubles in the last four games, and he had 11 assists in his prior meeting with LA.
Clippers (44-31, 2nd Pacific)
People have been sleeping on the Clippers as most of the attention has been on the top-flight teams (San Antonio, Golden State) and the return of the Houston Rockets. However, LA has improved on defense, giving up just over 100 points on average in the last five games, and they've been outscoring their opponents by nearly 10 points in that stretch.
Unfortunately, two of their last three losses have been to dismal opponents in Dallas and Sacramento.
Power forward Blake Griffin (21.1 ppg, 8.2 rpg) had 26 points in his last game against the Warriors. He's been slightly lower than his standards with an average of 16.3 points in his last four games. Shooting guard J.J. Redick (14.7 ppg) didn't play in the game against Sacramento and is questionable for this contest with an ankle injury.
Due to the back-to-back for Washington, the Clippers are favored by six points and the total O/U is set at 218 points. The Wizards are 6-1 against the spread in their last seven games with no days of rest.
