NBA Preview: Indiana Pacers on the verge of missing the postseason.
Indiana Pacers (37-38) at Toronto Raptors (45-30), 7 p.m. EST
Line: Raptors -6. Total 207.
The Pacers were sitting pretty on February 6 after a 93-90 home win over Oklahoma City. Indiana had a record of 29-22 and held the #6 spot in the Eastern Conference standings with a 6-game lead over #9 Charlotte and a 6.5-game lead over #10 Milwaukee.
The Pacers are now sitting on the edge of their seats.
Indiana is in a freefall, losing 16 of their last 24 games, and are now in the #8 spot, clinging to a half-game lead over the Chicago Bulls.
The remaining schedule is not helping matter for the Pacers, either. Indiana plays Toronto twice in five days with Cleveland sandwiched between those two games. They have Milwaukee, Orlando, Philadelphia and Atlanta to close out the season. Chicago will play Atlanta, New Orleans, Philadelphia, Brooklyn twice and Orlando.
The Bulls are going to make the playoffs and the Pacers are heading to the golf course in two weeks.
The Cavaliers are also in freefall. This has opened the door for Washington and Toronto to catch Cleveland in the standings before season’s end. Boston has already caught them as the Celtics are on top of the Eastern Conference by half a game entering Friday’s action.
Toronto has won 6 of their last 7 games and has an opportunity to improve their seeding for the playoffs while the Pacers are going in the opposite direction and are just 11-25 on the road this season.
Philadelphia 76ers (28-47) at Cleveland Cavaliers (47-27), 7:30 p.m. EST
Line: Cavs -10.5. Total 219.
Cleveland had their second team meeting this week after losing to the Bulls 99-93 Thursday night. Chicago has now won 20 consecutive home games played on TNT, dating back to February 28, 2013.
Chicago swept the Cavs 4-0 this season, becoming just the second team to ever sweep a LeBron James’ team 4-0 in the regular season. The Brooklyn Nets swept LeBron’s Miami Heat squad in 2013-14 during the regular season 4-0. However, when the Nets met the Heat in the playoffs that season, Miami won that series 4-1.
The only positive in the loss for James is that he passed Shaquille O’Neal for seventh place on the all-time scoring list.
Since LeBron has come back to Cleveland, the Cavaliers are 8-1 straight up against the Sixers. However, they are 1-8 ATS (Against The Spread) against Philly. James did not play in Cleveland’s only loss to the Sixers.
Philly is 47-27-1 ATS this season, which ranks them #1 in the league. The Cavaliers are 32-39-3 ATS which is #27 in the league. Tonight’s 10.5 point spread is the lowest Vegas number Cleveland has been assigned against Philly in a game that LeBron did not sit out since his return to Cleveland.
Houston Rockets (51-24) at Golden State Warriors (61-14), 10:30 p.m. EST
Line: Warriors -7.5. Total 231.5.
The road team has won all 3 games in the series this season. The Rockets won in double-overtime at Oracle Arena on December 1, while the Warriors won both games at the Toyota Center, including a 113-106 victory three days ago.
Golden State finally figured out how to win without Kevin Durant as they have won 9 straight games. Their defense is the reason for the turnaround. The Warriors are 10-1-1 to the under in their last 12 games, with the over coming in their last outing at San Antonio, a 110-98 win that went half a point over the closing Vegas total.
This sets up a “chart-play”, which is a play where you reverse course as soon as a streak of 4 or more overs, under, covers or not-covers is snapped. In this case, Golden State had its first over in 12 games last time out against the Spurs, which snapped a streak of 11 games that went under or pushed. So now you take the over in their next game.
There is a hefty Vegas total of 231.5 for these two teams to get over Friday night. They have gone over twice head-to-head this season, but one of those overs was aided by overtime. So the Warriors and Rockets have gone under twice in regulation time this season head-to-head. Houston is 8-6 to the under in regulation time in the back-end of back-to-back games this season.
The Rockets’ James Harden has gone ice cold shooting three-pointers the last three games, going just 5-for-30 (16.7%) from beyond the arc.
This game will be a true test for the chart-play, because there are a lot of other factors pointing to the under in this game.
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