NBA Premium Card 02/25

NBA - 505 Los Angeles Lakers @ 506 Indiana Pacers

Play #1

All season long, I’ve been telling that this Pacers’ offense is a bit of “streaky”, and right now I think we are catching them w/ a good “mood”. This will be their fourth game after the all star break and the IND offense was great against the bad defensive teams of ATL & MIL by scoring 108 and 110 points in those games. They indeed struggled @MIN but note that IND was playing @b2b spot and for some reason, their offense is really struggling in those kinds of spots.

The Lakers’ interior defense won’t have a chance against IND powerful frontcourt… LAL’s reb/rate% in L10 games is just 44.3%, so we can also expect IND to grab a fair number of offensive rebounds that will lead to plenty of second chance points for IND.

LAL’s offense is now in a streak of 4 consecutive games scoring +100 points… It helps the fact that Pau Gasol & K. Kaman are healthy and playing some minutes because they have now some inside presence and obviously, they can spread better the floor w/ shooters.

I expect LAL to dictate the tempo of the game…IND will score so easily that they will “relax” a bit on the defense end, that’s why I like the Over in here as my Single Dime Play.

Pick: 3 units (Single Dime Play) on 505/506 Over 206 @ -110 / 1.91 on Bookmaker

NBA - 507 Chicago Bulls @ 508 Atlanta Hawks

Play #2

It is confirmed that P. Millsap will miss tonight’s game and therefore, ATL is really shorthanded on the frontcourt! They have only E. Brand & M. Scott available right now…

That worked well in the last game against the Knicks as ATL explored in the fourth quarter for 39 points while their outside shooting was great w/ 16-31 3pts. However, note that we are talking about the Knicks – a team that really don’t want to score down low and have a terrible perimeter defense. Certainly, this isn’t the case of the Bulls… CHI will try to explore ATL’s lack of depth/quality on the frontcourt while their perimeter defense is way better vs. NYK.

In the last H2H between these two teams, CHI had the incredible mark of 65.6% rebound/rate% - to put it simple, despite shooting 50.6% FG vs. 43.8% from ATL, CHI still was able to grab 17 offensive boards vs. just 5 from ATL!!!

With CHI dominating the glass and scoring easily down low, I don’t think that ATL’s perimeter shooting will be enough for them to be competitive tonight and therefore, I’m taking the Bulls in here as my Single Dime Play.

Pick: 3 units (Single Dime Play) on 507 Chicago Bulls (-2) @ -110 / 1.91 on Bookmaker

NBA - 513 Houston Rockets @ 514 Sacramento Kings

Play #3 & #4

This will be a fun game to watch between two offensive minded teams…

The biggest difference is that HOU w/ D. Howard dominating and with some depth w/ their second unit, I think that we are dealing w/ a true contender in the Western Conference.

SAC w/ D. Cousins back has scored 105 and 109 points in L2 games while their defense was pretty decent. However, note that they have faced a Celtics team that was playing without R. Rondo and last game @DEN, Ty Lawson didn’t play the game and so, SAC had the luxury to play against two teams without their pure point guards. That won’t happen tonight against HOU…

HOU reb/rate% in L5 games = impressive 55.8%! Their only “bad” defensive game was @GSW in a b2b spot… they are rested for tonight and so I expect this contest to be a pure “run and gun” w/ the Rockets simply crushing the Kings on their own game!

Pick: 3 units (Single Dime Play) on 513 Houston Rockets (-4) @ -110 / 1.91 on Bookmaker

Pick: 3 units (Single Dime Play) on 513/514 Over 212.5 @ -110 / 1.91 on Bookmaker