New Orleans Pelicans vs Portland Trail Blazers betting tips and predictions for Thursday’s NBA game on BSNO. Damian Lillard looks to lead his Portland Trail Blazers to their 3rd win in a row as they visit the New Orleans Pelicans tonight at Smoothie King Center. Read on for all our free predictions and betting tips.
New Orleans Pelicans
New Orleans finally snapped their 3-game road losing streak last night with a win at Chicago. It wasn’t the prettiest of games as the Pelicans rallied from behind in the 2nd half to get the win. Brandon Ingram was the high point man with 22, while center Jonas Valanciunas added 21 in the win. At 6-5 after 11 games I think it’s fair to say this team has underachieved a bit, but that’s okay considering they’ve been through a couple of injuries early on and they are still building chemistry.
They are heavy favorites against the Blazers tonight as the oddsmakers have the spread set at -6.5 points. They are outscoring Portland by almost 10 points per game over the last 10 meetings and have won 7 of them, while also covering in as many games.
Portland Trail Blazers
Portland is also coming off a win last night as they triumphed in Charlotte thanks to Lillard’s 26 points and the defense which held the Hornets to just 37% shooting from the field and 25% from downtown. Jusuf Nurkic missed the game with an injury, he is listed as questionable for tonight’s game alongside 3 other Blazers players. That’s a big hit to their ambitions as they won’t have any presence on the inside with their center unable to play.
Portland struggles a lot against teams from the Southwest Division, they’ve won just once in 10 games against those teams and against the Pelicans they are 1-4 SU in their last 5 visits to Smoothie King Center. Portland’s only hope is for Lillard to go crazy here, but against his former teammate C.J. McCollum he might have a hard time getting going here.
Even though they are 5-1 on the road this season, there are just too many injuries to overcome for the Blazers here. The Pels just beat a solid Chicago team on the road, I have them winning at home for the 3rd time this season.
New Orleans Pelicans vs Portland Trail Blazers Predictions & Odds
You don’t see the projected total being set at 225 points often in games where the Pelicans play. This is the highest scoring team in the NBA at 118.5 points per game, but their defense is also among the worst which makes for a really good combination if you like betting on the over. That bet has landed in 8 of 11 games this season for them, including 5 of their last 6 at home. Portland’s defense has improved a lot this season, but playing without their center against a Pelicans squad that likes to push the tempo, I think Portland will opt to speed things up here.
Looking at the head-to-head stats the two teams are combining to score 225.9 points per game over the last 10 games, that’s with Portland being pretty bad on offense in all 3 meetings last regular season. This team has made a pretty big leap on both ends this year, because of that I think we’ll see a high scoring game here with a ton of points scored on both ends. Back the points.
