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The In-Season Tournament Quarterfinals have finally arrived and a star-studded showdown between the New Orleans Pelicans and New Orleans Pelicans is on tap Monday night. Let's check out our NBA odds series where our Pelicans-Kings prediction and pick will be made.
Squaring off for the third time in less than a month, the stakes are far higher than they've been lately with a trip to advance to the next round of the In-Season Tournament on the line. For the Kings, it ended up being Sacramento that outlasted a furious Denver Nuggets rally in a 123-117 home-win over the defending champions on Saturday night. Overall, the Kings are 11-7 and 6-2 at the Golden 1 Center on the young season.
On the other side of things, the Pelicans will enter play winners in two of their last three matches, but they happened to fall flat on their faces in a recent 124-118 loss to the Chicago Bulls. Despite the defeat, New Orleans finds themselves on the north side of the .500 mark and sit only one game removed of the Dallas Mavericks for the first-place spot in the hectic Southwest division.
Here are the NBA odds, courtesy of FanDuel.
NBA Odds: Pelicans-Kings Odds
New Orleans Pelicans: +3.5 (-110)
Sacramento Kings: -3.5 (-110)
Over: 237.5 (-110)
Under: 237.5 (-110)
How to Watch Pelicans vs. Kings
Time: 10:00 ET/7:00 PT
TV: TNT
Stream: fuboTV (Click for free trial)
Why The Pelicans Could Cover The Spread
Although their record leaves much to be desired, it is indeed refreshing to see the Pelicans at full health, which is something that hasn't happened very much over the last couple of seasons. Overall, the dynamic play of Zion Williamson, Brandon Ingram, and even Jonas Valanciunas are all capable for some big-time performances on Monday.
First things first, the Pelicans latest loss against the Bulls resulted in the inability to hit enough big shots when it mattered most. Overall, New Orleans only went 8-25 from beyond the arc despite shooting 50% from the floor as a whole.
All together, New Orleans does happen to shoot the ninth-worst shooting clip from three-point range at 35%, and there is no question that the Pelicans will need to hit some shots from deep if they are going to keep up with the Kings and their high-scoring ways.
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Most importantly, a glaring weakness that Sacramento has a tough time with comes in the form of cleaning the glass. Most of the time, the Kings find themselves on the losing side of the rebounding battle which could bode well for the Pelicans and their bigs.
Without a doubt, Valanciunas may be one of the more slept-on bigs in all of the NBA as he is putting together a rather solid campaign nearly a fourth of the way into the season. As its stands, the eleven-year vet is averaging 14 points per game while corralling nine rebounds per game.
While Sacramento has the likes of Domantas Sabonis and his stellar play down-low on the block, getting Valanciunas involved early and often could be the difference in New Orleans moving on to the next round of the In-Season Tournament.
Why The Kings Could Cover The Spread
Throughout the inaugural season of the NBA's In-Season Tournament, the Association had accomplished their exact goal in generating some early-year excitement around the league. Even more intriguing will end up being the possibility of hoisting the NBA Cup and earning an extra $500,000 dollars on top of their paychecks. For a Kings franchise that has been on the come-up the last couple of seasons, there is no doubt that an NBA Cup would be another accomplishment for this organization.
In order to take that next step to becoming In-Season Tournament champions and t0 cover the spread over a worthy opponent in the Pelicans, Sacramento will have to attack New Orleans in the form of a hectic, fast-break attack that the Kings love to thrive in.
Clearly, Sacramento loves to get out and push the pace especially after opponents' missed shots. Furthermore, the biggest reason that the Kings ended up going 4-0 in group play was due to superstar De'Aaron Fox who has averaged 36 points, 8.7 assists, and 8.0 rebounds per game.
Simply put, Fox is an absolute game changer and the more he makes plays on Monday, the bigger the Kings chances are to take care of business and cover the spread.
Final Pelicans-Kings Prediction & Pick
It doesn't get much better than this! With stakes higher than the average early-December regular season game, expect both the Kings and Pelicans to trade blow after blow in an attempt to come out on top.
At the end of the day, the Kings being at home combined with an offense that does not miss a beat in the scoring department will be too much for the Pelicans to overcome.
Final Pelicans-Kings Prediction & Pick: Kings -3.5 (-110)
