NBA Expert Tips and Best Bets | February 9

There is a nice slate of NBA games to round out the working week, with nine games set to take place on Friday Australia time. A number of them look like being pretty entertaining, too, headlined by the Timberwolves taking on the Bucks and the Lakers facing off against the Nuggets in a repeat of last season’s Western Conference Finals. These are my three best bets for the day’s action. 

Mavericks -2.5 | $1.87 with GetSetBet 

The Knicks have been great all season and particularly of late, and even with Julius Randle their system based play as well as the continued stardom of Jalen Brunson and the wild leap of Donte Divencenzo have helped them to continue on their winning ways. But in the fourth quarter of their latest outing, Brunson went down with an ankle injury, and while he appears to have avoided serious injury he does look set to sit this game out. The Knicks are a well coached team and have shown an ability to continue playing well even in the absence of one of their best players, but with both Brunson and Randle out it will be very hard for them to compete against the Mavericks. Dallas are certainly no world beaters but they do have one of the most talented back courts imaginable in Luka Doncic and Kyrie Irving, who will be by far the best two players on the court in this game. Irving has wasted no time returning to his best form since getting back on the court a couple of games ago, with a 36-point effort in just his second game back last time out, and the Mavericks have won those two games by double figure margins against first the Sixers and then the Nets. It’s never easy to win at Madison Square Garden – at least not against this iteration of the Knicks – but with Randle and Brunson out and the Mavs’ back court firing on all cylinders, they should be able to cover this 2.5 point line and then some. 

Coby White over 24.5 points | $1.90 with PlayUp 

One of the most promising things about the Bulls’ 2023-24 season to date has been the emergence of Coby White, who has taken a giant stride forward since Zach LaVine went down with injury. And with LaVine having now endured season ending surgery and likely on the trade block anyway, White will continue to be one of, if not the, focal points of the Bulls’ offence. He’s been very efficient from the field – and particularly beyond the arc – since taking on the role as the Bulls’ starting point guard, but he has gone through patches where he has not quite been as aggressive from a scoring perspective. Lately, his mood has been the exact opposite. White has been on a heater in his past three games, scoring 35, 26 and then 33 points for an average of 31.3 per game on 54.1% shooting from the field, and 50% from long range – that’s while taking ten of them a night. He is feeling himself in a big way and allowing himself to take the shots that he is more than capable of making, and against an injury ravaged Memphis Grizzlies team he should be able to get plenty of good looks once again. The 24.5 point over/under total betting sites have set for him is higher than his season average, but he’s a momentum type player and at the moment is riding a wave of it. He should be set for yet another big game with plenty of shots and a lot of makes, and having averaged seven points over this total in his past three games and coming up against a bad team, this is a good spot for him to continue his run of overs. 

John Collins over 6.5 rebounds | $1.75 with BlueBet 

Rounding out our list of bets for the day is another player prop, this time focusing on a guy who has been rebounding at a far higher rate than usual for an extended run of games now. Collins has put up solid rebounding numbers in the past, peaking at 10.1 per game in the 2019-20 season, but in his last three seasons with the Hawks that number was below eight. This year, it’s right at 8.0, and yet his over/under for this game is at 6.5, albeit with plenty of juice. Given that it’s only paying $1.75 I wouldn’t be looking at this if it were based purely on his average of eight, but given what he has been doing lately on the glass this looks like a really good bet despite the relatively short odds. He has passed this total in eight consecutive games, typically by a big number, with nine or more boards in all but one of those games and an average of over 10 per night in that time. Those are some pretty enticing numbers. In fact, given that he has got 9 or more in seven of his past eight games, if you can get this at over 7.5 at better than even money then I would certainly take that too – an even money bet for an event which has occurred seven of the last eight times is hard to go past. There is not all that much more that needs to be said about this one – even based on his season average Collins looks like he should go past this number, but having averaged in the double figures for a couple of weeks this might just be the best bet on the board for the day.