Basketball betting looks to be one-sided on Saturday as the Cleveland Cavaliers visit the New Jersey Nets. The Cavs are one of the best teams in the Eastern Conference while the Nets are the worst team in the league. Cleveland is heavily favored in NBA betting odds in this road game at New Jersey.
Basketball betting has seen Cleveland win six of the last ten against New Jersey but the Cavaliers are just 4-6 against the NBA betting odds in those games. Last month Cleveland won 99-89 at home versus the Nets but they did not cover the 14.5 point NBA betting line. Cleveland led the entire game but never really put the Nets away in basketball betting. New Jersey trailed by just two points with four minutes to go in the third quarter. Brook Lopez had 22 points and 15 rebounds in the loss. The Nets and Cavaliers have split the last four meetings in New Jersey although Cleveland won and covered the basketball betting odds in both games at New Jersey last year. The last five games between these two teams have gone under the basketball betting total.
Unlike last year, when Cleveland was great at home, this season the time to take Cleveland in basketball betting is when they are on the road. The Cavaliers have been far better in basketball betting on the road than at home. Cleveland is in the Top 5 in the league on defense and when teams play defense on the road they usually have a chance to win in basketball betting. The Cavs can still struggle to score when LeBron James doesn’t get any help but on the road the Cavaliers are laying fewer points.
New Jersey has been bad both straight up and against the basketball betting odds. There simply is not anything to like about New Jersey in terms of NBA betting. The Nets don’t score enough points to win very often in basketball betting as they are last in the league. Their defense isn’t horrible but they are still 19th in the league and that is not good enough when the offense is so bad. The lineup for New Jersey does have some talent with Devin Harris, Yi Jianlian and Brook Lopez but other than Harris it is very young. The Nets also have very little off the bench and that hurts them in basketball betting.