Lakers vs Celtics best bets

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The 23-26 Los Angeles Lakers, 13th in the Western Conference, visit the 35-15 Boston Celtics, first in the Eastern Conference at 8:30 pm EST Saturday night.

The league-leading Celtics are 7-point home favorites and -280 on the moneyline. Lakers’ backers can take back a big price of +235 for an outright upset win.

The Lakers played on Wednesday against San Antonio, winning 113-104 at home to the San Antonio Spurs. They got the win despite anyone in a Lakers’ uniform having a standout performance. Anthony Davis had 21 points, followed by LeBron James with 20. However, LA were more efficient in both field goal and three-point shooting and pulled away in the fourth quarter outscoring the Spurs 32-22. The Lakers also sunk seven more free throws to contribute to their nine-point win.

The Celtics come into this one with shorter rest, having last played on Thursday where they lost 120-117 in overtime against the New York Knicks. Jayson Tatum, 35 points, and Jaylen Brown, 22 points, each had good showings for Boston, but they were bested by Julius Randle and Jalen Brunson who had 37 and 29 points respectively.

Boston has hit one of their biggest skids of the season with losses in three straight games. They also lost on Tuesday in Miami, 98-95, and on Monday in Orlando 113-98. It’s just the second time this season they have endured a three-game losing streak.

These teams last played on December 13 in Los Angeles, with Boston winning 122-118 in overtime. Tatum led the way with 44 points, 9 rebounds and 6 assists. Brown added 25 points, with Marcus Smart adding 18 of his own.

Meanwhile, the Lakers’ stars had big days as well, with both James and Davis topping 30 points, with 33 and 37 respectively. They each added 9 and 12 rebounds.

The Lakers have struggled all season, and their road record has been part of the problem at 10-14. They’re an even 5-5 in their past ten games overall though. In their last four, they’re 3-1. While a win against the 31-17 Grizzlies is strong in that stretch, the other two wins came against the 14-35 Spurs and 23-25 Trail Blazers.

Still, for point spread bettors, the Lakers have gone 3-1 ATS in their past four and 5-2 in their past seven. The under has gone 4-1 in their past five. On the season, they are just 23-25-1 ATS though.

Boston has only failed to score 100 or more points four times this season. Two of those four games have come in their past three games. While they own a winning ATS record this season at 26-24, they’ve been burning money for their backers of late going 0-5 ATS. Four of those five games have also fallen under the total for the Celtics as well.

With the Celtics running cold lately and the Lakers cashing ATS tickets, while both teams have been playing to the under, I’ll back a close contest and take LA on the spread.

Pick: Lakers +7 (DraftKings)

While not all of the Lakers vs Celtics props have been released as of this writing, here are a couple of players to consider for your NBA player props.

James has averaged 33.63 points per game in January in 11 games. His last meeting with the Celtics saw him put up 33 points. James only finished with 20 points on Wednesday against the Spurs, but prior to that, his point totals were 46, 37, 23, 32, 48 and 35. The point total props for James in the past two games were 30.5 and 32.5.

So long as his prop totals come out in the low 30s for Saturday’s game, he should be a good bet for the over.

Jaylen Brown averages 7.1 rebounds per game which is exactly where his rebounds prop sits on Saturday at 6.5. But Brown has exceeded this total for rebounds in four of his past five games, pulling down 9, 5, 8, 9 and 12 boards. Additionally, when these teams last met back in December, Brown finished with 15 rebounds.

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