We have something of a rarity on our hands tonight, or at least I thought we did, but further research showed me it was something that happens more often than I remembered.
Game 3 of the Western Conference Finals will tip-off in Los Angeles, and as I write this, the Los Angeles Clippers are underdogs to the Phoenix Suns. Now, this makes sense. The Suns have won the first two games of the series and could be getting Chris Paul back.
Meanwhile, the Clippers will still be missing Kawhi Leonard, and even though he's expected to play, Marcus Morris is dealing with a knee injury. Still, the sight of a home team in a conference final being an underdog stood out to me, so I did some research to see how often it happens.
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As I said, it happens more often than I initially realized. This will be the first time it happened since 2019 (there were no home teams in the playoffs last year) when the Raptors were three-point underdogs to the Milwaukee Bucks in Game 4 of their series. The Raptors would win the game and go on to win the NBA Finals. It also happened in Game 4 of the Western Conference Finals in 2019, when the Blazers were two-point dogs at home to Golden State in Game 4. The Warriors won 119-117.
Still, if there's one thing about tonight's game that stands out, it's this: tonight will only be the second time since the 2011 season that a home team was the underdog in a conference finals game, and the opponent wasn't the Golden State Warriors, or it didn't have LeBron James on the team. The other game was the aforementioned Raptors-Bucks game in 2019, which had Kawhi Leonard. And once again, it's Kawhi's team playing the underdog role, so maybe it's him?
Will any of this play a part in my pick for tonight's game? You'll find out soon enough, but first, you should catch up on today's news.
Now let's go get this money.
All times Eastern, and all odds via William Hill Sportsbook
