NBA Picks

The Milwaukee Bucks had a lot of success against the Indiana Pacers this season, winning 3 of the 4 games, with their single loss coming by a 1-point margin. Now riding an 8-game win streak into the postseason, with a healthy roster outside of Damian Lillard, who seems set to return at some point in the playoffs, they will be positive they can get the series off to a strong start on the road. While the point guards scoring will be missed, the Bucks have adjusted well without him, leading the NBA in offensive rating over the last 10 games of the regular season. Giannis Antetokounmpo took on the playmaking burden, recording a staggering 51 assists in his last 4 outings. The Pacers should have issues matching up physically with the former MVP. Pascal Siakam is undersized in comparison which should allow the Greek star to dominate proceedings in this series.

The hosts will be relying on Tyrese Haliburton to be the catalyst for their offence, but he did face issues against the Bucks this season. The Pacers point guard averaged just 17 points per game across the 4 contests, making just 32.1% of his 3-point attempts. If he has any issues getting the offense going here, the hosts could find themselves in trouble against a team who were leading the league in true shooting percentage over the last 10 games. The Bucks only had Bobby Portis for 3 of those games and his presence coming off the bench should help further boost the visitors. He is averaging a 15-point and 11-rebound double-double in his games against the Pacers. Take the points on the Bucks as they look well equipped to keep this as a tight contest.

Milwaukee Bucks vs Indiana Pacers Prediction: Bucks +5.5 available at time of publishing. Playable to Bucks +4.5.

The NBA playoffs are nearly here and one of the best series of the opening round should come in the Western Conference between the Los Angeles Clippers and Denver Nuggets. These are teams that are trending in completely opposite directions, as the Clippers have been the top net rating team in the association over the past 6 weeks, thanks to the all-world play from Kawhi Leonard and James Harden down the stretch, along with a number of key contributions from role players across the roster on both sides of the ball. On the other side, despite getting one of the greatest offensive seasons in league history from Nikola Jokic, Denver is certainly not as good as it was a season ago, to say nothing of the 2023 team that won the title. This should be an evenly-matched affair, with plenty of momentum swings and lead changes between the teams. And no game should illustrate the long and compelling series we have ahead of us than a Game 1 in Denver where both teams should hit the ground running offensively.

When digging into the matchups in this opening game, I find myself straying away from backing a side and gravitating toward a high-scoring affair in the altitude of Denver. Given that the Clippers defense is one of the best units in the league, the Nuggets should look to push the ball in transition off made or missed shots as much as possible. For those that pay attention to Denver, this isn’t something out of the ordinary for Jokic, as he consistently makes outlet passes and wants to push tempo as much as possible. Even in the halfcourt setting, I’m still anticipating a strong game for the Nuggets offense, especially with Jokic, Jamal Murray and company coming off a week of rest and still flying high with new head coach David Adelman at the controls. Denver has had no trouble scoring all season long, but the glaring issue for the Nuggets is on the defensive end. Denver is a bottom 10 unit in defensive rating, and these woes have particularly showed up against high-level competition, which is exactly what the Clippers bring to the table with Harden, Leonard, Norman Powell and rising star Ivica Zubac at center. Ultimately, I’m expecting plenty of efficient halfcourt offense from both sides in a game that should finish closer to 230 total points.

Clippers vs Nuggets prediction: Over 223.5 available at time of publishing. Playable to 224.5

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The NBA Playoffs are set to get officially underway on Saturday with the opening round of action, and one of the more intriguing series of the first round comes in the Eastern Conference between the Detroit Pistons and New York Knicks. The Pistons are coming off one of the more surprising seasons in recent memory, winning 44 games and making it to the playoffs for the first time since 2018. For a team that won just 14 games a season ago, this is as massive of a one-year organizational turnaround as we’ve seen in some time. On the other hand, the Knicks entered this season with championship aspirations, but New York hasn’t quite been able to put it together and compete with the likes of the Boston Celtics or Cleveland Cavaliers in the Eastern Conference. However, the postseason represents a fresh start for Jalen Brunson and company, one that could given the team a clean slate and a chance to play with less pressure or expectations on their shoulders, now that Boston and Cleveland are the clearly established favorites in the East.

From a situational perspective, the Knicks are in as good of a spot as they’ve been in from a health and rest perspective in some time. That alone would have me looking to back New York to open this series, especially since teams coached by Tom Thibodeau are often at their freshest at the start of the first round, before typically suffering some sort of debilitating injury as the postseason wears on (see: OG Anunoby and Brunson last season). Additionally, the Knicks are going to be hosting a Pistons team that is fairly young and whose best player doesn’t have any kind of postseason experience at this level. Madison Square Garden is about as difficult of an environment to throw Cade Cunningham into for his first playoff game, and the inexperienced guard will surely be facing a number of different looks from the Knicks perimeter defense. Detroit generates most of its offensive success (14th in offensive rating) in isolation settings, but if New York is able to get the ball out of Cunningham’s hands with consistent success, I expect it’ll take the Pistons a bit to make an adjustment. We can expect Detroit to return in kind by sending double-teams at Brunson late in the shot clock. However, when it comes to these point guards swinging the ball, making the right reads and generating good looks for the role players, I’ll certainly trust the ancillary pieces on New York compared to Detroit’s personnel, which gives the Pistons a more limited offensive capacity.

Ultimately, New York should have more than enough in the tank to start the postseason off on a winning note against an inexperienced opponent. More importantly, teams that tend to win games in the playoff also cover spreads. In fact, after last postseason’s 75-12-1 ATS record for straight up winners, they are now on a 5-year run of a whopping 89.3% winning percentage against the spread. With that in mind, I’ll follow the trend and lay the points with the Knicks.

Pistons vs Knicks prediction: Knicks -6.5 available at time of publishing. Playable to -7.

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The fashion in which the Minnesota Timberwolves ended the regular season gives the even most pessimistic T’Wolves fan optimism that they can make noise in their 1st Round match-up vs the Lakers. Rudy Gobert posted 18.8 points and 14.9 rebounds over his final 10 games, Julius Randle appears to have overcome his injury concerns from earlier in the year and Anthony Edwards is just doing Anthony Edwards things. It all comes down to defense for the Wolves in this series. Since the beginning of March, Minnesota ranked 7th in defensive efficiency, while their opponent is only 18th during that same exact stretch. However, the question is can the Wolves contain Luka Doncic individually? One thing is for sure, with 8 wins in 10 road games they have every right to hope for a split in the opening two games of this series at Crypto.com Arena.

For the first time since 2012 the Lakers will be at home for Game 1 of their 1st Round series. That must feel really good for a team that has gone through so much change this season, the Lakers are exactly on the side of the bracket they wanted to be. The experience is on their side here, at least from an individual standpoint. We all still remember what Luka Doncic did to them in last season’s West Finals, I am sure he is in for a warm welcome in Games 3 and 4 at Target Center. LeBron James has played in a ton of these games already, so this is nothing new to him. Head coach JJ Redick has successfully masked all of his deficiencies on the defensive end, LeBron no longer has to be the number one fiddle on offense for this team to succeed.

Game 1 could go in a lot of directions, but if we are to judge this match-up from the regular season series then having home court could prove to be the difference here. The Lakers won the only meeting post the Luka trade in late February, but points were hard to come by for both teams in that game. I expect a gritty series opener, so let’s go with the under here.

Timberwolves vs Lakers Game 1 Predictions: Under 216.5 is available at time of publishing. Playable at that number.  

Game 1 of the Eastern Conference first-round series between the #2 Boston Celtics and #7 Orlando Magic will take place at TD Garden in Boston on Sunday afternoon. The Celtics are obviously the superior side and will almost certainly advance to the conference quarterfinals, but I’m not backing them on such a huge spread against an opponent that is worthy of respect. As such, my Magic vs Celtics pick is for the underdogs to cover 14.5 points. Orlando managed to win 2 of the 3 head-to-head matchups during the regular season, beating Boston by 14 points at home on December 23 and by 20 a little more than a week ago at the Garden. The latter result, of course, can be thrown out since the C’s were resting basically their entire team. Still, the bottom line is that the Magic will take some confidence with them into Sunday.

Moreover, head coach Jamahl Mosley’s squad is simply in awesome form right now. It has won 6 of its past 7 games and the only loss during this stretch is to Atlanta in a meaningless game that saw the Magic bench all of their top players. In other words, they have not lost a real game since March 31. The Magic stayed sharp by dominating their play-in game against the Hawks via a 120-95 decision on Tuesday, whereas the Celtics have not taken the court since last Sunday — that’s an entire week off, folks. I’m not saying Orlando is going to win outright, but it may be able to take advantage of a sleepy opponent and make this contest somewhat competitive.

Magic vs Celtics prediction: Orlando +14.5 (-110) available at time of publishing. Playable at that number.

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We are getting an absolute treat in the 1st Round of the West Playoffs as Steph Curry, Jimmy Butler and the Warriors take on the feisty, young and inexperienced Rockets. These two teams already played each other 5 times this season, with the Warriors coming out on top in 3 of those games. Points were hard to come by in 4 of those games, while only two of them were played after the Butler trade. It’s no secret that more people than not actually like this match-up for the Warriors who have owned Houston over the years, winning 15 games in a row at one point. That streak ended earlier this season, but it’s hard to argue with the advantages the Warriors have.

Houston’s biggest issue is that they don’t have a clear cut number one option on the team, for moments when the games are on the line. Some nights it’ll be Dillon Brooks, then Fred VanVleet will give it a go and then Jalen Green will take over. Depth is always good to have, but unlike in the regular season the rotations shrink in the playoffs and your top 7 guys will play the bulk of the minutes. The one advantage the Rockets will exploit here is Alperen Sengun at the center position. He crushed the glass in the 5 meetings during the regular season, averaging 11.2 boards per game while also putting up an efficient 17 points per game. But at the tender age of just 22, can he put up with the antics of Draymond Green and co. down low?

I’m expecting a hard fought series, 4 of the 5 games saw at least one team finish under 100 points, while 2 of them saw both. With the pace slowing down significantly in the postseason and these being the 5th and 7th best ranked defenses, I am aiming for the under in the series opener. The projected total of 213 points was surpassed only once this regular season, with the other 4 games averaging just 194.5 points. Back the under.

Warriors vs Rockets Game 1 Predictions: Under 213 is available at time of publishing. Playable at that number.