We’re treated to the first Victor Wembanyama-Chet Holmgren battle of the 2024-25 season on Wednesday night.
The pregame narrative: The pair were last season’s top-two Rookie of the Year vote-getters and I expect both to have a large impact on this game. I have prop picks on each in a +335 SGP.
Check out my Spurs vs. Thunder same-game parlay predictions for Oct. 30.
Spurs vs. Thunder predictions
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Parlay: Wembanyama over 10.5 rebounds + Holmgren over 1.5 threes + under 225.5 points (+335)
Wembanyama over 10.5 rebounds (-210): Where else to start with the first leg?
Wembanyama is coming off a 20-rebound game, his first time reaching double digits this season.
He’s facing one of the worst rebounding teams in the NBA that sorely lacks an interior presence due to Isaiah Hartenstein’s injury. The Thunder rank third-last in the NBA in rebounding rate.
And while it’s of course early, OKC was also 28th out of 30 teams in this category a season ago.
Speaking of last season, Wembanyama torched the Thunder on the glass. He topped this number in all three meetings, averaging 13.0 rebounds.
The 7-foot-3 phenom averaged 12.0 boards per game in his rookie season and a couple of quiet rebounding games to start the season mean next to nothing.
Don’t expect 20 again, but count on him to clear this big total.
SGP legs
Holmgren over 1.5 threes (-125): The other stud rookie from last year’s class has dropped more than 20 points in all three Thunder games. He’s also averaging 13.0 rebounds a night.
Wembanyama’s ability on the glass and his defensive capabilities have steered me away from Holmgren’s points/rebounds props, but I still want to target him.
With the caveat that it’s still early, Holmgren’s minutes are up by 3.0-plus per game. His scoring has erupted (23.7 PPG) but he hasn’t dialled it up from deep yet.
The 22-year-old is 1-2 against this line, taking five attempts in each of them.
He’s a strong shooter who converted at a 37.0% rate from deep last season, making two-plus threes in 37 of 82 games.
With the extra run and added scoring output, I think it’s reasonable to expect more 3-balls from Holmgren even if his long-range volume doesn’t explode.
The Spurs rank 25th in the NBA in opponent 3-point percentage, surrendering an average of 15.7 per game (fifth-worst).
Under 225.5 points (-175): These teams have combined for six games and have gone under this total four times.
While that might be simplistic, this isn’t: The Thunder have the NBA’s best defensive rating — by far — after ranking fourth last season.
Oklahoma City has held two teams under 100 points already and the most it surrendered was 104 to the Atlanta Hawks, who scored 119-plus in each of their other three games.
Even with Wembanyama, the Spurs have been a bottom-of-the-barrel offensive team but respectable on defence.
Having not played since Sunday, the Thunder will be well-rested and should put the clamps on defensively.
Picks made at 3:51 p.m. on 10/30/24.
Chris joined NorthStar Gaming from Covers.com where he was a publishing editor and wrote betting content. Before that, he was the sports editor at VICE Canada, worked for theScore and covered the Blue Jays for MLB.com. In addition to filling out the lineup card each day for the editorial team, Chris writes frequently himself, primarily on the NBA and MLB.