NBA - 807 Denver Nuggets @ 808 Boston Celtics
Projected Line: Boston by 6 points
Denver has been one of the best teams in the league lately and I haven't lost any opportunity in riding with them on this great run. We took Denver on their last four spreads and we cashed in all four occasions! However, I believe the Nuggets will be on a poor spot tonight and against a tough matchup for them against this new look Celtics team. Denver will play their third game in four days, while they are also on a back to back spot, as they played at Cleveland last night. It's not easy for any team to be on this spot, but when the Nuggets haven't played a back to back game since January 16th, then the spot gets even worse! Yesterday, the Nuggets used their good depth to crush Cleveland, but still three of their starters played more than 35 minutes!
The Nuggets crushed Cleveland down low, as I expected but they also gave out some worrying signs. They struggled on 3pts shooting, as besides Danilo Gallinari who shot 3-6 3pts, the rest of the team shot a combined of 3-11 3pts! Denver was also very sloppy in handling the ball, as they turned the ball over 20 times in that game!
They will now face a Celtics team whose defense will give Denver's offense a tough matchup tonight. We all know that the Celtics have one of the worst transition defenses in the league (#29 in the league while allowing 1.23 PPP), but since Courtney Lee and Avery Bradley became Boston's starting backcourt, they are only allowing 1.04 PPP on transitions! Of course it's still a small sample, but you can already see the Celtics doing a much better defensive job on this area!
Besides this, Boston is a great pick and roll ball handler defensive team and they are indeed #1 in the league with just 0.68 PPP allowed, but since Rajon Rondo got injured, they are absolutely shutting down everybody's pick and rolls by allowing just a ridiculous 0.47 PPP! Wow! The Celtics are also being aggressive in pressuring the ball handler and they have been getting a 15.43% opposing turnover rate on this span (#3 in the league during this span and #4 in the league for the season). As I've mentioned before, Denver was sloppy last night, so Boston has everything to create turnovers tonight! Ty Lawson had a tough matchup yesterday against Kyrie Irving and today, things won't get any easier for them, as Avery Bradley will surely defend him well.
I believe Boston's offense will surprise Denver in here. The Celtics can really play with an up and down style and they have been averaging 14.2 fast break points per game on their last six contests. They are sharing the ball well and with them forcing turnovers tonight, I expect them to score some easy points in transition, getting a comfortable win tonight in the process. I'm taking Boston on this game.
Pick: 3 units (Single Dime Play) on 808 Boston Celtics (-2) @ -110 / 1.91 on Bookmaker
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