NBA Betting Picks: Milwaukee Bucks at Houston Rockets

Added on Jan 17, 2011 by Jack Thurman in

NBA

Monday NBA betting features a matchup between two struggling teams as the Milwaukee Bucks head to Texas to face the Houston Rockets. The Bucks have underachieved this season, but they’ve also had their share of injuries to deal with. Houston is in a similar situation, and has lost Yao Ming for the year.

Milwaukee Bucks at Houston Rockets
January 17, 2011 12:05 PM Pacific

Both teams have similar records and poor recent form from a straight up standpoint, but there’s a big difference. The Rockets play lousy defense. The Bucks have trouble scoring points but are a much better team defensively than Houston. That makes this a matchup in which the Bucks can not only be competitive, but win outright. Milwaukee is dead last in scoring offense, averaging 91.2 points per game. There’s no easy solution to this problem, though they should get some help when Brandon Jennings returns from injury in late January. Defensively, its a different matter–Milwaukee has the #3 scoring defense in the league behind only Boston and New Orleans and ahead of Miami, Chicago and Orlando. Houston, on the other hand, has the #25 scoring defense in the NBA allowing 105 PPG. This will help Milwaukee’s points output and give the Bucks the opportunity to dictate tempo and force turnovers with their suffocating defense.

Both teams are 3-7 SU in their last 10 games, but the Bucks have covered 6 of their last 10 games while Houston is 2-6-2 ATS in that stretch. Rockets are 1-3 SU/ATS this year as a home favorite in this price range (-3′ to -6 points) and the Bucks have covered 4 of the last 5 meetings including an outright win at home on December 10. We give Milwaukee a big edge in defense and coaching and with 2 full days off since their last game we look for them to take the outright victory here.

Bet Milwaukee Bucks +4 over Houston Rockets