NBA Betting Free Picks: Indiana @ Washington

Added on Apr 14, 2010 by Jack Thurman in

NBA

Sportsbooks will close the book on the NBA betting regular season on Wednesday night, and unfortunately many games are off the board. In other cases, we’ve got games with unmotivated teams who either quit on the season a long time ago or else are bound for the playoffs and resting starters. Nevertheless, we’ve found an attractive wagering position in a very unlikely spot:

Indiana Pacers at Washington Wizards
April 14, 5:05 PM Pacific

At first glance this is a pointless matchup between a couple of losing teams playing out the string. In Washington’s case, you would be correct. The Wizards have had an awful season, ‘highlighted’ by Gilbert Arenas’ locker run gunplay fiasco. They’ve lost 20 of their last 24 games straight up, punctuated by a 16 game losing streak. The only thing preventing them from being the worst team in the conference is the lowly New Jersey Nets, who had a good run at being the worst team in NBA history before they scrapped out some wins down the stretch. The Wizards ATS performance is somewhat better in their last 24 games at 10-14. Still, considering they’re getting points every night that more likely demonstrates that opponents have no reason to get motivated to face them.

Indiana’s struggles this season were due to more pedestrian circumstances than wanna be thugs playing cops and robbers with real guns in their locker room. The Pacers got off to a bad start that got even worse when their best player–Danny Granger–missed over a month due to injury. Since he’s returned, however, they’ve been a different team. Indiana has gone 12-4 SU in their last 16 games including wins over Charlotte, Oklahoma City, Utah and Cleveland. They’re also 14-5-1 ATS in their last 20 games. They’ve also taken care of business as a favorite (15-9 ATS) and particularly as a road favorite of 3 or less where they’ve a perfect 3-0 SU/ATS this season.

At this price, we have no problem backing the team with much more upside even on the road. Pacers should win and cover with ease–they’ve already won 3 games against Washington this year going 2-1 ATS and they’ve gotten better while the Wizards have gone in the other direction.

Bet Indiana -2 over Washington