Portland is the better team, has short revenge and a monster backcourt edge with Brooklyn down to its third-string point guard.

The Trail Blazers are legtimate playoff contenders in the stronger Western Conference. The Nets are bottom feeders in the Eastern Conference, losers of eight of their last 11 games.

Portland's defense has been better, but its offense has been disappointing. The Trail Blazers, though, shouldn't have problems putting up points versus the Nets, who rank 29th in points allowed at 114.2 and is 25th in defensive ratings. Only twice all season have the Nets held opponents to fewer than 100 points.

Not only do the Nets rate an edge in the frontcourt with Jusuf Nurkic, backed up by Ed Davis and Meyers Leonard. but own a huge guard advantage with Damian Lillard and C.J. McCollum. Those two compose one of the top guard tandems in the league. Brooklyn has lost Jeremy Lin and D'Angelo Russell, its two best scorers. Untested reserve Spencer Dinwiddie is holding down the fort right now at point guard.

Led by Russell's 21 points, the Nets upset Portland, 101-97, 13 days ago. The Trail Blazers had won the previous four games in the series.