Going into Game 2 of Mavericks vs. Celtics on Sunday at 8 p.m. ET on ABC, Dallas is on the ropes. Thursday’s Game 1 loss was arguably even more concerning than the 107-89 final score might indicate.
At DraftKings, the spread for Game 2 is Boston -7 (-110), while the total is also nearly unchanged from Game 1 at 214.5 (Over -110, Under -110).
Before diving into the NBA Finals Game 2 spread and total analysis, let’s look back at what we saw in Game 1 on Thursday night.
NBA Finals Game 1 Takeaways
For about half of the first quarter of Game 1 of the NBA Finals, the Mavericks and Celtics delivered exactly the competitive, high-scoring series many fans expected.
But Boston caught fire throughout the rest of the first half, allowing it to build a 58-29 lead late in the second quarter en route to a 63-42 halftime cushion.
Dallas responded to its disastrous first half with a strong third quarter, cutting the lead to as few as eight points with 4:28 to play in the third. By the end of the third quarter, though, Boston had extended its lead back to 20-plus points thanks to a 14-0 burst that shut the door on a potential comeback.
Below are three questions the Mavs must answer between now and Sunday.
How will Luka Doncic and Kyrie Irving respond?
Irving, who scored 12 points on 19 shots and missed all five of his 3-point attempts, will have to play much better for Dallas to stay in this series. Doncic finished Game 1 with 30 points on 12-for-26 shooting (4-for-12 on 3-pointers), but he and Irving combined to shoot just 18-for-45 from the floor, including 4-for-17 from outside. If the Celtics continue to prevent Doncic and Irving from beating them as passers (they contributed just three of their team’s season-low nine assists on Thursday), both will have to shoot lights-out to keep games close.
Who has the edge in the paint?
Wait, which one of these teams is so good at defending the basket? Dallas bigs Daniel Gafford and Dereck Lively II averaged a combined 3.3 blocks per game in the regular season. In Game 1, however, Dallas blocked only one shot as a team. Raise your hand if you had Maxi Kleber recording the only rejection by a Maverick in Game 1. Meanwhile, Boston’s Kristaps Porzingis and Jaylen Brown (three blocks apiece) and Jayson Tatum (two blocks) erased one Mavericks layup attempt after another.
Is it time to talk about Porzingis’s MVP chances?
Speaking of Porzingis, does the big Latvian have a shot at an unlikely Finals MVP push a la Andre Iguodala back in 2015? Going into Game 2, his Finals MVP odds are +550 at DraftKings, the fourth-shortest in the series after Tatum (+120), Brown (+310), and Doncic (+350). Caesars lists Porzingis’s MVP odds at +600, while BetMGM (+650) and FanDuel (+700) give him even longer odds.
His first game back from injury could not have gone better, and based on Game 1, Dallas has no answer for him. The scary thing for the Mavs is that Porzingis not only went for 20 points, six rebounds and three blocks on 8-for-13 shooting from the floor, but did all that damage in just 21 minutes, while taking only four 3-pointers.
2024 NBA Finals Game 2 Spread Analysis
Game 2 is tough to predict given the possibility of Doncic and/or Irving having a massive night to even the series. But as evidenced by not only Game 1, but also oddsmakers moving the futures price on Boston to win it all from around -220 to as short as -425 (Caesars), this series might not be nearly as evenly matched as many fans thought.
Doncic will likely get his points throughout this series, but Boston’s athleticism across the board is going to be a major problem for Dallas the rest of the way.
It might be tough for the Celtics to win Game 2 as convincingly as they won Game 1, especially considering how well they shot the ball from outside on Thursday night, but Boston to cover 7 points feels like the right move here. Another reason to like the Celtics is the possibility of Porzingis playing well over 21 minutes now that it’s clear he’s healthy and not suffering from rust after an extended absence during these playoffs.
Pick: Boston -7 (-110) on DraftKings
2024 NBA Finals Game 2 Total Analysis
Boston is clearly going to cause problems for Dallas when it has the ball unless it’s just ice-cold from the 3-point line. Horford and Porzingis in particular subjected both Gafford (just 14 minutes played in Game 1) and Lively II (five fouls committed in 18 minutes) to brutal nights. Going forward, the Porzingis-Horford duo looks like a nightmare matchup for the Mavericks’ top two centers. They grabbed just eight rebounds total in Game 1 and unless they can find a way to survive against Boston’s five-out attack, the Celtics will continue to roll offensively.
While Boston has a successful formula in place, there are major questions about where the non-Luka scoring will come from for Dallas. With that in mind, the Under is the play.
And until Dallas can prove its role players can complement Doncic in this matchup, taking the Under on the Mavs’ team total is another good bet.
Picks: Under 214.5 (-110) on DraftKings, Mavericks Team Total Under 103.5 (-108) on DK
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