NBA Expert Tips and Best Bets | Nov 23

This Thursday, Australia time, all but two teams will take to the floor for a huge day of NBA action. That means that there is plenty of opportunity from value across the course of the day, whose first games will tip off at 11am AEDT and whose last will tip off at 2pm AEDT. That should provide you plenty of entertainment to get through the work day, and here are some of our best bets to hopefully help out in that regard, too.

Hornets – 3.5 |$1.90 @ PlayUp 

The Hornets have not had the greatest start to a season in which there appeared to be plenty of scope for improvement, but in their last start they delivered on the potential elements of their roster suggests they should be capable. Led by the supremely talented Lamelo Ball and with a four-man wing set up including Gordon Hayward and the returned Miles Bridges, they managed to knock off the early favourite to win it all this year in the Boston Celtics. Now, they get to play perhaps the worst side in the league, and they only need to beat them by a very small amount on their own home court to cover this line. The respective records of these two teams is not wildly different in the early stages of the season, but expect them to separate further as the season goes on. The Hornets are clearly the better team, and on their home floor should be able to cover the line of just 3.5 points. 

Over 237.5 Total Match Points | $1.89 @ GetSetBet

It’s bordering on ridiculous just how high scoring the Pacers’ games have been this season. They’ve regularly been involved in games surpassing 250 or 260, some of which have been due to high opposition scores, some due to high scores of their own, and most due to both. Their most recent outing was the absolute epitome of that. In what more closely resembled an All-Star hitout than an actual NBA game, they beat the Hawks 157-152 for a total of an incredible 309 points. They have passed this total against all manner of opposition eight times in a row, mostly with ease, and in their last ten games the only which hasn’t passed it got mighty close with 237.5 points. It doesn’t really matter who they are playing – they don’t really play defense and play high octane offense led by Tyrese Haliburton, meaning high scoring hitouts are a near certainty. This is a pretty high line, but based on recent results this game should pass it easily. 

Under 224.5 Total Match Points | $1.90 @ BlueBet

The Bulls have not been involved in particularly high scoring games for the most part this season. Of their last six games, none have gone over 227 points, while their last four have all been comfortably under this total – including three of 200 points or less. They play a slow game style, solid defense and are not particularly potent offensively – making for a great recipe for low scoring games. The Thunder, meanwhile, have been in plenty of low scoring games themselves. They put up a big total against the struggling Trail Blazers in their last outing and had a high scoring overtime game prior to that, but they’ve been in plenty of lower scoring games too and were it not for a couple of blowouts against really bad teams, wouldn’t have participated in nearly as many high scoring games. They likely won’t put up a huge score against the Bulls, who in turn never really score particularly high themselves, so in a game which may end up closer to 200 total points the under looks like a good bet here.