NBA predictions

Basketball predictionsThe National Basketball Association (NBA) regular season and postseason provides basketball fans with plenty of exciting games to watch and bet on. Here at Betting Tips Africa, we will be your point of reference if you want to profit from NBA tips. We will endeavor to provide throughout the regular season and into the playoffs, analysis, NBA predictions, and odds for all the major upcoming NBA games.

Our NBA experts are very experienced having followed the league for decades and will provide well-researched NBA betting tips covering a wide variety of betting markets .

List of NBA predictions

Boston Celtics vs Dallas Mavericks NBA Final 2024
Dallas Mavericks vs Boston Celtics NBA Finals 2024
Indiana Pacers vs Boston Celtics NBA Playoff tips
Minnesota Timberwolves vs Dallas Mavericks NBA Playoff tips
Boston Celtics vs Indiana Pacers NBA Playoff tips
Indiana Pacers vs New York Knicks NBA Playoffs 2024
OKC Thunder vs Dallas Mavericks NBA Playoff tips
Dallas Mavericks vs LA Clippers betting prediction
Philadelphia 76ers vs NY Knicks betting predictions
LA Clippers vs Dallas Mavericks betting tips
Denver Nuggets vs Los Angeles Lakers NBA betting predictions
LA Lakers vs Denver Nuggets betting tips
Minnesota Timberwolves vs Phoenix Suns NBA betting tips
Milwaukee Bucks vs Indiana Pacers betting tips
Philadelphia 76ers vs Miani Heat betting tips
Sacramento Kings vs Golden State Warriors betting predictions
Nuggets vs Heat NBA betting predictions
Nuggets vs Heat NBA betting predictions
Celtics vs Heat NBA betting tips

If you want to read picks for other Basketball Competitions go to our Basketball overview & for the full list of all our betting tips visit our pick for win prediction site!

NBA betting predictions

A Brief History of the NBA

For you to appreciate what you see now, it is prudent to take a little peek into the past.  The National Basketball Association (NBA) is a professional basketball league formed in the United States in 1949 by the merger of two rival organizations, the National Basketball League (founded 1937) and the Basketball Association of America (founded 1946). In 1976 the NBA absorbed four teams from the American Basketball Association (ABA), which disbanded that year.

League growth and membership

By the time we got to the early 1980s, the NBA was plagued by financial challenges. There were low attendances, low TV ratings, and a lack of national appeal which meant the most teams (franchises) were making losses. Things however turned around with the appointment of David Stern, NBA commissioner from 1984, He revolutionized the sport and helped to turn it into an international entertainment company.

He engaged in aggressive marketing of NBA star players like Magic Johnson, and Larry Bird in the 80s, and, went a notch higher with Michael Jordan in the 90s. Other innovations ideas included league caps (limits) on player salaries, lucrative broadcast rights for network and cable television, and expanded All-Star Game festivities.

The NBA membership was divided into two conferences, each with three divisions. There were 30 teams, aligned as follows

Eastern Conference

Atlantic Division: Boston Celtics, Brooklyn Nets, New York Knicks, Philadelphia 76ers, Toronto Raptors

Central Division: Chicago Bulls, Cleveland Cavaliers, Detroit Pistons, Indiana Pacers, Milwaukee Bucks

Southeast Division: Atlanta Hawks, Charlotte Hornets, Miami Heat, Orlando Magic, Washington Wizards

Western Conference

Southwest Division: Dallas Mavericks, Houston Rockets, Memphis Grizzlies, New Orleans Pelicans, San Antonio Spurs

Northwest Division: Denver Nuggets, Minnesota Timberwolves, Oklahoma City Thunder, Portland Trail Blazers, Utah Jazz

Pacific Division: Golden State Warriors, Los Angeles Clippers, Los Angeles Lakers, Phoenix Suns, Sacramento Kings

NBA CHAMPIONSHIP

The top-ranking teams from each conference at the end of each season engage in a 7 game playoff series to determine the NBA champion.
The most dominant teams in NBA history include the Bill Russel led Boston Celtics from the 60s, the Lakers teams from the 80s and early 2000s, and of course the Michael Jordan Chicagoo Bulls from the 90s. In recent years, the Steph Curry Warriors team have dominated winning 3 titles in 5 years between 2015 and 2019.  

NBA BETTING MARKETS

Moneyline

Moneyline betting is very straightforward and easy to understand, so it is the most common choice for novice bettors. It involves simply picking the winner of the game, regardless of the margin of victory. Each team is assigned a Moneyline, with the favorite having a small odds and the underdog having bigger odds

Handicap

The handicap bet is one of the more popular bet types when to comes to the NBA. We have strong and weak teams in the association. Bookmakers, therefore, use the handicap to even out the game from a punter’s perspective. The handicap basically represents the projected winning margin for the strong team or losing margin for the weak team – here you can find our handicap tips.

Totals (Over/Unders)

Betting on totals, also known as over/unders, involves picking whether the combined score of the game will go over or under a predetermined number set by bookmakers. Typically, NBA basketball has quite a bit of scoring compared to most other sports, even the college game. So the trend is mostly on the higher side.

Prop Betting

Prop bets are wagers on in-game events excluding the standard moneyline, run line, and total, which are the three most conventional and popular basketball bets out there. Many NBA props are centered around whether a specific player will reach a statistical milestone set by oddsmakers. There are also many team and game props to choose from as well.

NBA Futures Betting

This entails placing bets on markets that are long term in nature. These typically tend to have very good odds. Although most markets here are team-oriented, there are also future bets on players as well.  Some common NBA Future Bets include:

  • NBA Champion
  • Eastern/Western Conference Winners
  • Division Winners
  • Team Win Totals
  • To Make/Miss Playoffs
  • Player Awards (MVP, Sixth Man, Scoring Champion, Rookie of the Year, etc)

Punters need to note that many of these future markets remain open even after the season has started and the odds would keep fluctuating depending on the performance of the team/player.  

Live Betting

Live betting is available on most bookies for NBA games. With the growth of mobile betting, this has also grown in popularity. As the game progresses, bookies automatically update the odds for the various markets available inplay for that game. This allows punters to bet on it from start to finish.

What NBA tips do We offer?

From these bet types, our expert tipsters offer the following for our selected NBA tips released every Mondays and Thursdays:

  • Moneyline
  • Handicaps
  • Totals (Over/Under)
  • Player Specials (When Available Pre-Match)

You can take advantage of betting bonus sites that offer various promotions from most bookies for new punters to try out these NBA predictions.

NBA ODDS

Many bookies offer NBA games for betting purposes. However, there are some bookies that usually go over and above to provide hundreds of betting markets (both pre-match and inplay) on the NBA games.

Based on our assessment of these bookies we recommend the following bookies for our NBA betting tips: 1xBet, 22Bet, Melbet and Bet365.

As explained before, the convenience of placing bets through the mobile app cannot be overated. Get more details on the best apps and how to download them from our review of the best betting apps in Africa