NBA

NBA Betting Guide for Monday 3/7/22: Expect Points in Minnesota

Brandon Gdula  —  @gdula13 Mar 7th, 2022
A lot of trends point to an over for the Timberwolves and Trail Blazers. Which other bets can we make?

Betting on the NBA can get a little overwhelming throughout the season because there are games every day, and there's just a lot to track throughout the season and entering every night -- spreads, over/unders, injuries, and so on.

But you can rely on numberFire to help. We have a detailed betting algorithm that projects out games to see how often certain betting lines hit, and you can track line movement within games and compare odds over at the oddsFire section of the site. You can also track spread bet percentages at NBA odds.

Where do our algorithm, our power rankings, and the betting trends identify value in tonight's games? (All odds from NBA odds.)

Portland Trail Blazers at Minnesota Timberwolves

The Minnesota Timberwolves can pull off a 4-0 series sweep over the Portland Trail Blazers tonight on their home court. They have wins of 5, 2, and 14 points so far this season against Portland. The 14-point win came on Saturday.

Notably, Damian Lillard remains out.

My preferred action in this game is the over (233.5) despite Lillard's absence. My model is anticipating a 238.6-point game, and numberFire's model rates the over as a three-unit suggestion.

In their past 10 games, Minnesota's matchups are 8-2-0 on the over, and Blazers games are 5-5. However, Portland has gone over their own implied total in 6 of 10 games; Minnesota has done it in 7 of 10.

As for a spread bet, numberFire's model likes the Blazers (+14.5) to cover. Over their past 10 games, the Blazers are 4-6 with an abysmal 13.0 point differential, on average.

While our model at numberFire doesn't love their chances (17.5% win probability), it views the spread as 10.2 points rather than 14.5.

Los Angeles Lakers at San Antonio Spurs

The season series between the Los Angeles Lakers and San Antonio Spurs favors Los Angeles 2-1. That said, San Antonio won the most recent matchup by a score of 138-110 while the Lakers shot just 18.5% from three and lost the turnover battle 14-6.

The Lakers are only 3-7 over their past 10 with a spread-adjusted point differential of -5.1. The Spurs are 4-6 with a spread-adjusted differential of +2.1.

Overall, numberFire's model likes the Spurs to win this one with a very nice 69.0% probability, making their moneyline (-132) a three-star play. A -132 moneyline implies a 56.9% win rate.

Spurs -2.0 is also a two-star recommendation.

Since 2019, home teams favored by 2.0 points have a 57.2% win rate and a 54.7% cover rate.

New York Knicks at Sacramento Kings

The top play in this matchup between the New York Knicks and Sacramento Kings is looking like the under (232.0).

Our model likes the combined point total to be 222.3, and the under is rating out as 67.5% for an expected return of 28.8%.

Across the 25 most similar games to this matchup in our historical database, the under is 22-3 (88.0%), including the 8 most similar matchups.

The algorithm here also is into the Knicks +3.5 as a three-star play.

It's rating the Knicks as a slight favorite (53.5%).

New York is reeling in the win column (2-8 in their past 10 with a -5.7 point differential). The Kings are a better 4-6 but with an unimpressive -3.5 point differential.