The NBA Play-In Tournament continues on Thursday and Friday with the final two games. We went a perfect 4/4 on our betting tips in the first round of games and are confident we’ve got some more winners on the way here!
NBA Betting Tips: Play-In Tournament
Indiana Pacers at Washington Wizards
Friday 10am AEST, Capital One Arena
Indiana put on a clinic on offence in their elimination game against the Hornets on Tuesday, putting up 144 points and winning by 27 points in an easy wire-to-wire victory. Domantas Sabonis was huge with a 14/21/9 line in 33 minutes, while Brogdon was damaging with 16 points in just 21 minutes.
Washington put up a decent fight for three quarters in their first Play-In game against the Celtics, but they had no answer for Jayson Tatum in the fourth quarter and eventually went down by 18 points. Both Russell Westbrook and Bradley Beal had sub-par performances compared to their usual output and will need to lift to keep the Wizards season alive.
All three meetings between these teams in the regular season happened post All-Star break, so they’ll certainly be familiar with each other’s style of play. With that said, the defence they played on each other barely improved after each outing as amazingly, there was an average of total points scored of 272 per contest. Even with the added intensity of a playoff type atmosphere, it’s hard to see that average dropping by 35 points, which is the number required for the ‘overs’ not to salute here.
Russell Westbrook will be looking forward to this matchup considering how dominant he was in each of their three regular season meetings. He had PRA tallies of 70, 59 and 67, and recorded at least 14+ points, 14+ rebounds, and 14+ assists in all three games. Back him into cover his PRA line again on Friday.
Prop: Westbrook O54.5 PRA ($2)
Memphis Grizzlies at Golden State Warriors
Saturday 11am AEST, Chase Center
Memphis got the jump on the Spurs in their elimination game on Wednesday to lead 19 points at quarter time. The Spurs were able to fight their way back into it and push the Grizzlies deep into the fourth term, but they managed to hold on thanks to a huge performance from Jonas Valanciunas (23 points, 23 rebounds) and great defence by Dillon Brooks.
Golden State looked as though they had the Lakers rattled when they led them by double-figures at the main break on Thursday, but LeBron James and Anthony Davis found their rhythm in the second half and proved too tough to handle down the stretch for the Warriors. Despite the loss, Steph Curry continued his phenomenal run scoring the ball with another 37 points.
These teams met just a couple of days ago at the Chase Center in Oakland and it was the Warriors who cruised to a wire-to-wire victory. It was their second win by 12+ points in three meetings with the Grizzlies this season, which is certainly cause for concern for Grizzlies coach Taylor Jenkins. Unfortunately for the Grizzlies, we think the Warriors just match up with them really well and should have too much firepower for them in this do-or-die game, particularly with it being on their home deck. Another double-figure win for the Warriors over the Grizzlies certainly isn’t out of the question here.
Value: Golden State Warriors 11+ ($3.66)
Golden State Warriors -3.5
$1.90
