Why the Lakers need to Sweep!!!!

The winner of this series has to play the winner of the UTAH vs HOUSTON match up.  If people have been paying attention UTAH has won the first two games on HOUSTON's home court. This makes me believe UTAH is going to sweep Houston.

Game 3 of UTAH vs HOUSTON is Thursday the 24th at Utah, and Game 4 of the series is Saturday the 26th @10:30 AM at Utah. I don't see Houston winning either of these games to delay the series, but I can only hope. 

The league has the Lakers scheduled to play Game #3 vs the Nuggets on the the 26th @5:30 PM and Game 4 vs the Nuggets on the 28th.  Game 5 if necessary is the 30th. Game 6th would be the 2nd and Game 7 would be the 4th. 

Basically UTAH could sweep Houston before the Lakers even play Game 3 vs Denver.

We can not give Utah that much time to prepare and rest. Utah is a good team and Sloan is a good coach. Historically, when teams have extra time to prepare for a team they play much better.  I don't like giving UTAH even a slight chance to steal 1 at the FORUM. Momentum is a huge thing in the NBA.

Why did this happen? I think the NBA thought a 4-5 matchup would actually last longer and not be so one sided, and the league thought a 1-8 match up would be over quickly. So they set up the games accordingly assuming the series would be over at the same time.  This is what the league gets for ASSUMING.

Honestly I don't like the Lakers playing Denver. Denver sucks on the defensive side, and when they play a team like Utah, that knows how to defend it is going to bother the Lakers who are used to playing against a team that can't even spell Defense let alone play it.  Earlier this year the Lakers played Devenr and routed them, and had their next game at UTAH where the Lakers were routed by a UTAH team who didn't even have Boozer starting due to injury. The Lakers lacked defensive intensity during that game and just fell apart.

http://www.sportsline.com/nba/gamecenter/recap/NBA_20071130_LAL@UTA

I know the Lakers own the series versus UTAH this year 3-1. I really wanted the Lakers to Play UTAH because of this.

http://www.sportsline.com/nba/gamecenter/recap/NBA_20071104_UTA@LAL

http://www.sportsline.com/nba/gamecenter/recap/NBA_20071228_UTA@LAL

http://www.sportsline.com/nba/gamecenter/recap/NBA_200803
20_LAL@UTA

In either case, the Lakers need to sweep so they can hinder Sloan from having so much time to prepare for the Lakers.

I totally echo both concerns you bring up in your post, whitecat;

1)  the disparity of the 1st round scheduling that has the potential to reward Utah with a leg up on rest and preparation for the 2nd round, and

2) the fact that playing a defenseless team like the Nuggets aren't doing the Lakers any favors in helping them prepare themselves for the like of the Jazz, or the Spurs for that matter.

That said, I think it's important for the Lakers to stay focused on the task at hand, not get ahead of themselves (although us fans can!), and continue to make the most of their match-up with Denver to shore up their transition defense, and exploit their low post presence with Gasol and Odom.  It's all good, people.  No matter what happens, we are in the midst of a magical postseason run by this new Laker unit and this is only the tip of the iceberg.

I want nothing to marginalize the Lakers chances for the 2008 NBA Championship.  That means;
1.  taking care of business against the Nuggets
2.  facing off against the Northwest Division championship Jazz in the WCSF - which, let's face it, is fixing to be a great series any way you slice it - which I nevertheless see the Lakers winning in 6 games
3.  taking on the defending NBA champion San Antonio Spurs in the WCF - with all due respect to the Suns, and as much as I know we'd all like to send them packing this year, I just don't see them advancing and, frankly, the prospect of dethroning a legitimate championship contending team like the Spurs would be much more validating
4.  matching up with the top seeded and Eastern Conference champion Celtics in the finals - guys, this is the goal...anything less is patently unacceptable!  A Lakers / Celtics final makes so much sense for so many different reasons that...well...don't get me started!  Let's just sit back and enjoy every moment of this run, it's gonna be fun!

I think whitecat's point was that it seems as though Utah is in the driver's seat in terms of them having the advantage of having more time to prepare than the Lakers do - even if both teams sweep, simply by virtue of an early game 4 date.

Lemme tell you something, without Yao, the Rockets have been exposed by a bigger, tougher, and deeper Jazz team - who are also ruthless at home.  And, unfortunately for Houston, McGrady is no Kobe and therefore is in no position to spearhead a miracle comeback at the Salt Palace.

So, he's right - Lakers have to take care of business and not allow the Nuggets to somehow get back in this series if for no other reason than to keep pace with the Jazz.

Yes my sentiments is exactly. While I really dont want the Lakers to look ahead and concentrated on sweeping the Nuggets. The Jazz looking pretty damn tough.....And lets throw all of the regular season stats out of here because play-off stat are completely different than the regular season stats. But even though I dont want to think just because the Lakers won one game over the Nuggets and the series is over. The Nuggets can still come back and take some games from us. Karl will try to retool the Nuggets front courts to stop Gasol and Odom. He will change their back court to help more with their scoring so if Phil and the Lakers can match player to player with the Nuggets tomorrow then we would be in better shape. Two Nuggets players that I am worried about are Kenzi and J.R, those two can stablelize their defense and their attack on our defense. With Ronnie questionable for tomorrow and we dont have any other solids back up center to stand in. Kenzi could do some serious problem underneath if not from the three point line.

Go Lakers