Los Angeles Lakers vs Golden State Warriors betting tips and predictions for Thursday’s NBA game on TNT. The All-Star weekend festivities are over and the NBA returns with a massive game at crypto.com Arena as the Lakers host the defending champions Warriors. Read on for all our free predictions and betting tips.
Los Angeles Lakers
These next 23 games for the Lakers are one of the biggest challenges of LeBron James’ career, according to him at least. LA finds themselves only 13th in the Western Conference, but the good news is a play-in tournament spot is just 2 games away. Head coach Darvin Ham says his goal is to finish 6th at the end of the regular season, which is a bit far fetched considering the Mavericks are 3.5 games ahead of the Lakers and it’s hard to predict them throwing away so many games in such a short period of time.
The Lakers will be optimistic ahead of tonight’s game though, they just beat the Warriors on the road without James in the line-up, now the King returns and is aiming to lead his team to their 15th home win of the season. The overhauled roster is showing signs of life, they’ve improved dramatically on the defensive end since trading away Russell Westbrook.
Golden State Warriors
The Warriors didn’t do many moves before the trade deadline, their biggest issue right now is staying healthy with the likes of Stephen Curry and Andrew Wiggins both missing tonight’s game. They got blown out by the LA Clippers 134-124 in their last game before the break, which was their 3rd loss in 4 games.
The offense has been clicking lately, but defensively they’ve allowed at least 120 points in 3 of their last 4 games, so against a fast paced Lakers squad they’ll have to be on their heels on that end of the floor. Golden State doesn’t have a good track record vs Western Conference opponents having covered the spread just once in 7 games, plus they are only 1-8 ATS in their last 9 games vs Pacific Division opponents.
Although LA is just 14-14 SU at home this season, they should have the edge here being the healthier team. They are 4-2 SU in the last 6 meetings at Crypto.com Arena, I’ll be backing them to cover the spread here.
Los Angeles Lakers vs Golden State Warriors Predictions & Odds
It’s no surprise that the projected total for tonight’s game is at 238.5 points, these two teams play at the 1st and 3rd fastest pace in the NBA this season with both of them averaging over 104 possessions per game. However, neither of the two games played so far this season have seen that many points, and with both teams coming out of the All-Star break I’m not sure they’ll be able to shake off the rustiness from not playing any competitive basketball for over a week.
The Lakers traditionally go under the total in home games this season, their record stands at 13-15 on the O/U, with their last 5 of 7 such games cashing on that bet. With Curry and Wiggins out, the Warriors roster will have to somehow come up with an extra 45 points to mask their absence here, I’m just not convinced they have it in them to pull something like that off here. I’m backing the under.
