The Phoenix Suns and Sacramento Kings meet for the second time this week.
The pregame narrative: Phoenix is on a back-to-back without Kevin Durant but I still like it to cover a massively teased-up spread. Fading Devin Booker and De’Aaron Fox rounds out this +250 ticket.
Check out my Suns vs. Kings same-game parlay predictions for Nov. 13.
Suns vs. Kings predictions
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Parlay: Suns +10.5 + Booker under 31.5 points + Fox under 26.5 points (+250)
Suns +13.5 (-278): Sacramento beat Phoenix on Saturday night, 127-118, but that game required overtime.
Durant didn’t play but the Suns fought well and I expect them to battle once again without their star power forward.
The Kings are off to a middling 6-5 start. They’ve covered this line three times, but all of those wins were against bottom-six teams in net rating (Jazz, Raptors, Trail Blazers).
Phoenix is 9-2 and Mike Budenholzer has the squad playing relentless defence.
The Suns are holding opponents to the sixth-lowest effective FG% (52.7) and ninth-lowest mid-range shooting percentage (40.9%), per Cleaning the Glass.
Sacramento takes 40.5% of its shots from the mid-range, the most in the NBA.
SGP legs
Booker under 31.5 points (-220): Booker is one of the league’s premier scorers but this line asks a lot of him.
He did drop 31 last night but that was against the Jazz. Utah has the third-worst defensive rating and seventh-highest opponent field goal percentage.
Sacramento is a much better defensive team, ranking 12th in defensive rating and 11th in opponent FG%.
This has also proven to be a tough matchup for Booker. Since the start of last season, he is 0-6 against this line when playing the Kings, averaging 22.8 points per game.
Booker is unquestionably the guy in Phoenix with KD sidelined, but that cuts both ways. Mike Brown can solely focus his game plan around slowing the shooting guard, so don’t expect a nuclear performance.
He’s also gone under this line in six of nine without Durant since the start of last season (1-4 in last five).
Fox under 26.5 points (-210): Earlier I spoke about how Phoenix makes life difficult on its opponents in the mid-range.
Fox takes 45% of his shots from that area of the court which is in the 90th percentile of all players.
He’s still attempting plenty of shots with DeRozan in the mix but adding a career 21.3 PPG scorer naturally takes food off the table.
Fox has gone under this mark in seven of 11 games this season. He scored just 21 points on 43.5% shooting in 41 minutes against the Suns on Saturday.
NBA picks made at 12:13 p.m. on 11/13/24.
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Avery joined NorthStar Gaming as an intern in 2022 before stepping into a full-time role soon after. He loves betting on and analyzing golf — mainly because it’s easier than actually playing — but is a fan of all sports, from the NFL to the UFC.