NBA Picks 3/23 – Cleveland Cavs @ Brooklyn Nets

NBA Picks 3/23 – Cleveland Cavs @ Brooklyn Nets

by NBA analyst Thomas Quaynor

The Cleveland Cavaliers (46-28) battle the Brooklyn Nets (39-33) for a second straight game tonight in Brooklyn, Cleveland won Tuesday night’s game 115-109 led by Donovan Mitchell’s 31 points. Cleveland is a 4-point favorite and the total is 219.5.

This will be the third time in two weeks that Cleveland has had to play consecutive road games against the same team, they played two road games each at Miami and then at Charlotte from March 8th though March 12. Cleveland won three of those four contests beating Charlotte twice and Miami once. Cleveland looks to be locked in as the 4 seed in the Eastern Conference as they are four games behind third place Philadelphia and four games ahead of fifth place New York. Brooklyn is desperately hanging onto the 6 seed in the East as they are just percentage points ahead of 7th place Miami.

THE SKINNY ON BOTH TEAMS

After a surprising 44-38 season last year, the Cleveland Cavaliers shocked the NBA world when they swooped in and acquired three-time All-Star guard Donovan Mitchell in a trade with the Utah Jazz. The Cavs gave up three unprotected first-round picks (2025, 2027 and 2029) as part of the trade package for Mitchell.

Mitchell has rewarded the Cavs this year by averaging a career-high 27.4 points per game, along with 4.6 assists, 4.2 rebounds and 1.5 steals. Michell gives the Cavs the franchise player they’ve lacked since LeBron James left in 2018, not surprisingly the Cavs are on pace to win 50+ games for the first time since 2018. Mitchell’s backcourt mate Darius Garland has also played very well again this year averaging 21.9 pts, 7.8 asts and 1.3 stls per game.

The Brooklyn Nets have lost four straight games and are in danger of falling into the play-in round, where they would need to win one or multiple games to qualify for the playoffs. Despite the recent struggles as a team, forward Mikal Bridges, who was the centerpiece of the Kevin Durant trade, has played like an all-star in Brooklyn averaging 25.4 points, 4.5 rebounds, and shooting .496 from two and .406 from three in 17 games as a Net. Guard Spencer Dinwiddie, who was part of the Kyrie Irving trade package from Dallas, has averaged 17.6 points and a career-best 8.2 assists per game in his 17 games as a Net.

THE PICK

You’d expect teams to split a back-to-back 2-game mini series in the regular season, but Cleveland looks to be a lot better than the Nets right now even though they are separated by just 7 games…Lay the 4 and take Cleveland tonight!!