Projected Line: 204 points
Both teams are on a good physical spot for tonight, as San Antonio had two days off and Toronto had four days off prior to tonight's game. San Antonio is coming from an excellent home win against Dallas, where they absolutely crushed the Mavericks. Even with Dirk Nowitzki back, San Antonio's ball movement was excellent and that was the reason why they made 20 treys and scored 129 points! The Spurs moved the ball from side-to-side, worked in some high-low, and kicked the ball out again, leaving the Dallas defense reeling from all directions. San Antonio crushed Dallas with 8-15 FG on transitions and 18-30 FG on spot ups, with 15-21 on 3pts! Dallas also looked good on transitions with 8-12 FG, but they were incredibly horrible on pick and roll ball handler plays with 2-17 FG on 21 plays for just 0.38 PPP!
“We took a plain old-fashioned butt-whooping in every which way you can think about,” Mavericks forward Shawn Marion said. “And then they broke a record.”
Toronto is coming from a home win over Orlando last Friday night. However, the Raptors didn't have great numbers in that game. Toronto shot 40.7% FG (vs 50.0% FG from Orlando), got outrebounded by 32-45 and
"outassisted" by 20-22! So, how did the Raptors win that game? Ball handling was the key, as they committed only 9 turnovers the whole game, while Orlando committed the double of that. As a result, Toronto attempted 11 more field goals than the Magic. They also made twice as many threes. Even with Jonas Valanciunas out of the game with just four minutes played, Toronto's second unit saved the day with a good flow.
With the Raptors new lineup, with Andrea Bargnani, Kyle Lowry and now also Jonas Valanciunas out of the lineup due to injuries, the Raptors have been played at a slow pace, but with a very good offensive efficiency! With Jose Calderon as the starting PG, the Raptors aren't committing turnovers on offense, while Calderon is giving his teammates better looks on offense. This is why the Raptors are shooting 76% FG at the rim with this new lineup, with they are just averaging 66% FG at the rim this season. They have also improved on pick and roll roll man plays (1.19 PPP vs 1.10 PPP), spot ups (0.97 vs 0.92), off screens (1.16 vs 0.87) and cuts (1.48 vs 1.28)! San Antonio's defense have been regressing on pick and roll roll man and cuts defense, perhaps because they are now playing with a bigger lineup with Tim Duncan and Tiago Splitter together on the starting lineup.
On the other hand, Tony Parker will crush Jose Calderon on offense due to this speed, while the Spurs frontcourt won't have problems in pounding the Raptors thin frontcourt that will have to play with Ed Davis and Amir Johnson, as both Andrea Bargnani and Jonas Valanciunas are out for tonight. The Raptors have won their last five games, however they faced five teams with poor offenses or in poor spots at the time: Dallas is #19 and they are currently struggling plus they were on a terrible spot as they had played an overtime game at Boston the night before; Houston is #6 but they faced Toronto at a noon game with the Rockets having just traveled from Houston to play that very early game; Cleveland is #26 on offensive ratings, Detroit is #21 and finally, Orlando is just #28. Toronto will now face the super offense of the Spurs, who are #5 on offensive ratings and they are healthy right now, so I expect San Antonio's offense to pound Toronto's defense tonight.
This will be the second and final game between these two teams this season, with the Spurs having won at Toronto by 111-106 on a double overtime game. It's important to note that this wasn't a good spot for the Spurs, as they were in the middle of a road trip back then, they had just 1 day rest after a game against Indiana and the game against the Raptors was an early 1PM game. In that game, Andrea Bargnani was ridiculous with 2-19 FG, while Dominic "zero offense" McGuire played 16 minutes. This time things will be different. San Antonio will crush Toronto on offense, while the turnover-free Raptors will also score a good number of points on pick and rolls and cuts due to Calderon's excellent passing skills. Therefore, I expect a high scoring game in here and so, I'll be taking the Over on this contest.
Pick: 3 units (Single Dime Play) on 717/718 Over 200 @ -110 / 1.91 on Bookmaker
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