The Toronto Raptors are in a dire state at the moment, losers of five straight and eight of 10.
Toronto is on the heels of a 16-point loss to the banged up Golden State Warriors at home and hit the road to face the Philadelphia 76ers on the second night of a back-to-back. The Sixers has won four in a row and seven of 10 now with Joel Embiid playing at an insanely high level.
The MVP candidate looks the part of one, leading the league and scoring at over 33 points per game this season. Can he lead Philadelphia to a fifth straight win against the Raptors?
Here are the odds and our best bet:
Raptors vs. Sixers Odds, Spread and Total
Raptors vs. Sixers Prediction and Pick
The Raptors can’t buy a bucket at the moment, 27th in effective field goal percentage during the month of December. However, the team is above the league average in terms of points scored per 100 possessions considering they are getting to the free throw line at the highest rate in the league this month.
This will be huge against a Sixers team that is sending teams to the line at a top 10 rate, but Philly has the offense to offset that, sixth in offensive rating this month. Around a healthy Embiid, the Sixers are scoring not only in bunches, but in an efficient manner, fourth in effective field goal percentage over the past two-and-a-half weeks.
Toronto doesn’t have a big man to check Embiid (not that many teams do) but his the big man’s ability to score at will, but also find shooters on the outside should lead to another efficient offensive showing from the Sixers.
This game can stay close with Toronto’s ability to get to the line, so I’d rather look to the over as my favorite play.
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Game odds refresh periodically and are subject to change.