Knicks vs. Pacers Game 3 odds, expert pick, prediction: 2 bets to back Indiana

Knicks vs. Pacers Odds

Friday, May 10, 7 p.m. ET, ESPN

Odds via DraftKings. Get up-to-the-minute NBA odds here.

New York Knicks

It shouldn’t come as a surprise that the Knicks' success is highly dependent on the status of Brunson and Anunoby. But regardless of Brunson’s inclusion in Friday’s lineup for New York, this is a good spot for Indiana. Even if Brunson plays, he likely won’t be 100%, and either way that’s bad for the Knicks as their only reliable scoring option.

The longer this series goes, the higher the Pacers' chances get of winning the series. They have a significant depth advantage over New York, but lack the top-tier personnel comparatively.

Tom Thibodeau has been utilizing a seven-man rotation for much of the playoffs, and since Bojan Bogdanovicwent down for the season with a foot injury, rotations have only gotten tighter.

Mitchell Robinson, who came back just in time for this playoff run, has also been ruled out for the remainder of the season. That means Thibodeau needs to figure someone else into the lineup, and we’ve already seen that someone is Precious Achiuwa. He clearly isn’t the defender and rebounder that Robinson is, but because of Indiana’s lack of defense, he’s a lot more playable against them than he was against the 76ers last round.

Achiuwa is a solid rebounder for his size and is an above-average defender, but nowhere near Anunoby defensively. He could be in line for added workload as he sees a 2% usage increase with Anunoby off the floor, per pbpstats.com.

Alec Burks could also be dusted off for this game, which would be a massive downgrade defensively for New York.

Indiana Pacers

The Pacers have been an interesting team all year — highly flawed, but highly entertaining. They’re elite on one end of the floor, not so elite at the other. Indiana’s style all season has been to run teams off the floor with high pace and let the offense take over by giving them more possessions. That hasn’t been overly effective against the Knicks, who are used to playing with some pace because of their ability to run the break off steals and rebounds.

But with Anunoby in question for New York, that should lead to fewer steals on the break and give the Pacers a significant advantage in Game 3.

We’ve already seen the number move to reflect some significant sharp money on Indiana. Their line opened at -4.5, but has since been bet as high as -8. It’s ping-ponged back to -7, but I see more movement on the horizon based on the injury information and how the sharp money responds to it.

Game 2 sailed over the total, as many Pacers games have this post season. The over in Pacers games is 6-2, but the team total has the same record. When the Pacers are scoring, it’s enough for everyone. However, the two Pacers games that have gone under — both against the Bucks — were because the Pacers scored just 92 and 94 points and in both instances lost the game.

I don’t expect the Pacers to lose this game, but I’m not interested in laying -8 to such a scrappy Knicks team that never quits even when the game is out of reach.

Knicks vs. Pacers

Betting Pick & Prediction

I expect the Pacers to come out fast and aggressive in their first home game of the series, down 0-2 to a battered Knicks team. But there’s a few angles we can play them without having to lay -8.

The first option is a first-half play. The motivation spot for teams down 0-2 is often cited as a reason to take teams on the spread for the full game, but if we look at recent historical trends, that strategy is more effective in the first half. According to Bet Labs, playoff teams coming home down 0-2 are 70-38 ATS in the first half since 2005. If we look since the 2015-16 season, they’re 25-11-1 in the first half for 32% ROI. I expect Brunson plays, so I think you can wait until he's officially announced in and get a better number before betting this.

The second is the Pacers team total over. The Pacers were the most profitable team to the team total over during the regular season, according to EV Analytics (49-32). If we take just their home record, that improves to 27-13-1 for 24.7% ROI.

In the playoffs, they’ve continued that trend. Indiana has gone over their team total in both games against the Knicks so far, but more importantly, they’ve gone over in every win this season. While the Pacers don’t win every game they go over, they have gone over in every win.

As banged up as the Knicks are right now, I’d rather not rely on their ability to score with a full game over, so I’ll just isolate and focus on the team I think wins the game.

Pick: Pacers 1H -5 | Pacers Team Total Over 114.5