NBA Expert Tips and Best Bets | Dec 12

After the Lakers beat the Pacers to become the inaugural In-Season Tournament champions, the NBA world enjoyed a day off, LeBron James relaxing with his IST MVP Trophy, adding to one of the most extraordinary resumes in the history of sport. On Tuesday, Australian time, the league will be back in full swing with 13 games across the day involving all but four teams. With plenty of opportunity to sniff out some value, these are the three best bets that we have found for the day’s action. 

Over 247.5 Total Match Points | $1.89 with GetSetBet 

The Pacers going over their match points total has been one of the most reliable bets so far this NBA season, even with betting agencies setting those totals incredibly high. That has changed a little in their last three games, all three of which have yielded 247 points (the total set for this game) or less, but given those were In-Season Tournament finals, we can write those ones off. With a higher intensity and more on the line games are typically slower paced and invariably lower scoring, but with the regular season resuming as per normal on Tuesday Australian time, they should be back to their wildly high scoring ways. Prior to those three IST Finals, they had passed the 247.5 point total set for this game in five of their past six games and 11 of their last 13, with many of those games flying past that number. This occurred regardless of who they were playing, with the lighting fast pace with which the Pacers play meaning that high scores were hard to avoid. Included among that group of games was a matchup against the Pistons, and that one passed this total too. Admittedly it was a close run thing, with 249 points scored in that game, but it looked like clearing it easily until the Pistons only managed to put up 17 points in the final quarter with the game clearly over. It’s hard to argue with 11 of their last 13 regular season games going over this total, so I’m comfortable locking it in as one of the best bets of the day.

Victor Wembanyama Over 10.5 Rebounds | $1.88 with PlayUp 

Victor Wembanyama has managed nobly to live up to the extraordinarily high expectations placed on him coming into his first season in the NBA, with the lanky Frenchman already a dangerous player at both ends of the floor. He is averaging over 19 points and 10 rebounds, while the 2.7 shots per game he is stuffing are a key indicator of his dominance at the defensive end of the floor. And those stats may be set to become even gaudier, with coach Gregg Popovich sending Zach Collins to the bench to start the game in the Spurs’ most recent outings and subsequently moving Wemby to the starting five position. With one less big man on the floor, more rebounding responsibility was invariably going to come the way of the rookie, and he responded with a whopping 20 boards. Don’t expect him to repeat that in this game, but he doesn’t have to. If Collins comes off the bench once again – which presumably he will given the experiment is only one-game old – it will give Wembanyama more opportunity to snare rebounds, and given his opposing starting five in Alperen Sengun – though extremely talented and a genuine candidate for the Most Improved Player Award this season – isn’t the most athletic center in the league, Wemby should be able to comfortably surpass the 10.5 rebound total set for him by NBA betting sites.

Joel Embiid To Have A Triple Double | $3.80 with BlueBet 

Now to our long shot of the day. Joel Embiid is putting together yet another fantastic season the year after he won his inaugural MVP, repeating his absurd scoring and rebounding numbers. Crucially in his quest to go two from two, however, he has also drastically improved as a passer, jumping up from 4.2 assists per game last season to 6.4 in 2023-24 so far. What’s more, many of his high assist games have come over the last few weeks, with his ability to capitalise on the necessity of opposing teams double teaming him having improved drastically. The Sixers seriously lack anyone who can even remotely guard the big Cameroonian, as was evidenced when they played just a few days ago and he had 50 points. He also had seven assists in that game, and this time around there is good reason to think that his assist number will be higher. The Wizards are not particularly good at either end of the floor, but surely even they will have the wherewithal to recognise that if they aren’t more aggressive defending him, he will once again go close to putting 50 points on them. If that does turn out to be the case, it will open the door for more Embiid assists. He will have no problems getting the ten points needed for a triple-double, obviously, while he also hardly ever fails to get ten or more boards, so the assists are the major concern. He hasn’t triple doubled all that much in his career, but he had one a couple of games ago and in two others in his last seven, he has finished with a double-double and nine assists. It could very easily have been three triple-doubles in the last seven games for Embiid, and with a matchup which will likely result in plenty of double teams and hopefully a lot of assists as a result, this looks like a good bet at close to $4.