After losing 11-straight, the Lakers finally kicked the Denver curse on Saturday, to stay alive in this round 1 series. That said, they are faced with a road elimination game on Monday night.
The Nuggets opened as a 7.5-point favorite, but early action and Jamal Murray's injury status has moved the line to Denver (-7). The total opened at 218.5 but has already been bet down to 217.
Each of these teams has covered the spread in 2 out of 4 games this series, with the under cashing in 3 out of 4 games.
This game will tip off at 10:00 PM EDT as the second half of TNT's Monday night doubleheader.
We are taking the points with the Lakers early here, as this line could move considerably if Murray is ruled out.
In reality, this is really the only play at the moment. We bet the under in this series when the totals were 220+, but 217 feels about right. If you want to bet the Nuggets, you are better waiting for the odds to move in your favor if Murray is in fact ruled out.
The Lakers lost game 1 by 11 points, game 2 by 2 points, game 3 by 7 points, and won game 4. This means they've covered 7.5 points in 3 out of 4 games in this series. We expect that trend to continue and for the Nuggets to close out the series by a narrow margin on Monday.
An elimination game for LeBron, this prop is THE one to take this Monday night as the Lakers look to send this series back to Los Angeles with increased momentum.
LeBron has averaged over 33 PPG in 27 career elimination games, and since joining LA, has gone for 29/40/30 points in those games.
He’ll play at least 38 minutes tonight which means at least 20 shot attempts. With Murray potentially out and the Nuggets bench due to play more minutes than accustomed to, this bodes well for LeBron who has stuck around the 27.3 PPG mark all series.
No Jamal Murray would mean added value to Jokic’s 3-pointers made prop. Although Nikola only had 5 of 21 games this season without Murray where he made more than 1 3-pointer, only six of those games came with just two attempts or less from downtown.
In simple terms, Nikola puts up more threes when Jamal is off the court. This series, the potential MVP has hit this over in half the games, while shooting 13 attempts from downtown in four games. We like this over, but keep up-to-date on Murray’s health.