NBA playoff best bets April 24: Bet on Pelicans to cover, Heat to clear team total
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New Orleans is 15-5-1 ATS as road underdogs this season. Photo by Kyle Phillips/AP.
Jordan Horrobin
@JordanHorrobin
April 24, 2024

It's a variety pack of NBA best bets for tonight, with a team total, a point spread and a player prop.

The pregame narrative: In the first leg of Wednesday's doubleheader, I like the Miami Heat to clear a modest team total against the Boston Celtics. Also, Celtics guard Derrick White looks like a good bet to stay hot from 3-point range. Later on, look for the New Orleans Pelicans to cover as underdogs in Oklahoma City.

Check out my NBA best bets for April 24.

NBA best bets

Best Bet: Heat over 92.5 points (-121)

The Heat are among the least explosive offences in the NBA, and that is even more apparent in the absence of Jimmy Butler.

But Miami cleared this line in Game 1 amid a subpar effort, and I think it can do so again.

The Heat scored just 14 points in the third quarter on Sunday but managed to scrape out 94 in the end. Two factors lead me to believe the can do at least as well in Game 2:

  • The 3-point shooting on Sunday was below Miami's standard. The team finished 12-of-37 (32.4%) from beyond the arc. During the regular season, Miami was a 37.0% 3-point shooting team.
  • Miami can (and should) get to the line more often. The Heat only attempted six free throws on Sunday, which is exactly half of their previous season low.

To expand on the second point, it'd be fair to see a dip in free throw volume without Butler, given that he's particularly adept at drawing contact on offence. Still, the team had the eighth-highest free throw rate this year (25.7%) and should do a better job of getting to the line.

This year, Miami played 22 games without Butler and averaged 109.0 points, per StatMuse. The Heat hit this over 19 times in that span and should be able to do so again.

Key stat: Miami has gone over 92.5 points in all 15 games against Boston since the start of last season (playoffs included).

Quick picks

White over 2.5 threes (-130): White ended the season on a heater, and he picked right back up to start the playoffs.

Over his final 13 regular season games, the veteran guard canned 3.4 threes per game at a 40.0% clip. And he hit this over in 10 of those matchups.

After a 4-for-8 performance from deep in Game 1, White has now gone over 2.5 threes in nine of 11 games against the Heat dating back to last year's playoff series.

Pelicans +8 (-115): The Pelicans had a shot at the buzzer to beat the Thunder in Game 1. With how strong New Orleans has been as a road team this season, that should come as no surprise.

New Orleans had the second-best road net rating (+5.4) in the NBA this season, and the team was 28-14 straight up as a visitor.

More importantly, the Pelicans are an NBA-best 15-5-1 ATS as road underdogs. And they're the only NBA team with a winning record SU as road 'dogs (13-8), per Team Rankings.

Including Sunday's two-point loss, New Orleans has covered a +8 spread in three of four matchups against OKC this year. I expect the Pels to at least push the Thunder in another close game.

Picks made at 9:15 a.m. on 04/24/2024.

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