Raptors (+4.5) @ Warriors (213.5)
Pick: Under 213.5
As expected, Kevin Durant remains sidelined for Golden State as the series shifts to the Bay Area on Wednesday night. Durant’s status will certainly be worth monitoring for the rest of the week though as it seems like he’s getting closer to returning which could provide value for bettors either on a Golden State side or going over the total. Beating a line move always requires a certain amount of risk tolerance though so proceed with caution there.
Not only is Durant out for the Warriors in Game 3, but Klay Thompson’s status is very much up in the air after suffering a hamstring injury in the fourth quarter of Sunday’s Game 2. Regardless of Thompson’s status, it’s fair to assume he won’t be 100% if he does suit up tonight at Oracle Arena. The guard out of Washington State was the Warriors’ leading scorer in Game 2, putting up 25 points in 32 minutes of action and the game landed on a total of 213. So it doesn’t seem like oddsmakers have made any adjustment on tonight’s total with Thompson’s status, and productivity if he dresses, looking iffy.
We haven’t seen the best defensive game from the Raptors yet in this series and if Toronto is going to ensure itself a split in Oakland and return to Canada with the series reduced to a best-of-three, it will have to defend at a higher level than it did at home. With Durant’s continued absence and uncertainty surrounding Thompson’s performance, Wednesday would feel like the right time for Toronto to lock down defensively and hang around in the upper 90s or low 100s.
I lean to the Raptors catching the 4.5 on the side tonight, but don’t like the Toronto side quite as much now that the spread has ticked down from the six-point chalk Golden State opened at. Therefore, I’ll go under the total expecting more of a rock fight than we saw in the first two games.