There are several key trends to know ahead of Game 1, starting with Boston’s record as a home favorite. The C’s are 26-21-2 against the spread as home favorites this season, winning those games by an average margin of 14.4 points per game.
Boston also has the best against the spread record in the first half of games this season (63-32-1).
Dallas Mavericks on the Road
The Mavericks are an NBA-best 34-16 against the spread on the road, but we can break that down even further.
As a road underdog, Dallas is 14-11 against the spread, which isn’t as great, but it thrived as a road favorite, going 20-5 ATS. Unfortunately, the Mavs are road dogs in Game 1.
Game 1 Favorites Dominate Since 2005
Since 2005 Game 1 favorites are an insane 16-3 against the spread, and going back the past 30 years, they are 21-9 against the spread.
Boston is favored by 6.5 points in Game 1, and it has covered in two of the three opening games of its playoff series.
Odds refresh periodically and are subject to change.
If you or someone you know has a gambling problem and wants help, call 1-800-GAMBLER.
Last week, as thousands of green-clad fans spilled out of TD Garden and onto nearby Causeway St. still buzzing—and for many, still buzzed—from Boston’s Game 2 win over Indiana, an unmistakable chant filled the warm spring air.
We want Kyrie …
We want Kyrie …
It will be Dallas vs. Boston in the NBA Finals. It’s also Boston vs. Kyrie. Five years after Kyrie Irving’s abrupt exit, public (basketball) enemy No. 1 is back in town. They have met in the playoffs before, with Irving’s Nets wiping the floor with a battered Boston team in 2021 and the Celtics sweeping Brooklyn in ‘22.
A trip to the second round was at stake in those series.
Said Irving, “Boston is in the way between our goal.”
In Boston, the disdain for Irving runs deep. He’s Ulf Samuelsson in high tops. Roger Goodell in gym shorts. The most disliked NBA player since Bill Laimbeer. What Reggie Miller is to New York, Irving is to Boston. The only difference is Miller never wore a Knicks uniform. On eBay, you can still buy Irving jerseys in Celtics green.
Time heals most wounds. Not these. These have barely scabbed over. Irving has not exactly attempted to ease the tension. In 2021, before Irving returned to Boston for a first-round playoff series with Brooklyn, he said he hoped not to hear any “subtle racism.” After beating the Celtics in Game 4, Irving walked to center court and stomped on the logo.
There will inevitably be attempts to rewrite history in the days ahead. Irving didn’t hate Boston. He just wanted to go home to New York. He didn’t have bad relationships with his teammates. That’s media stuff, reporters chasing clicks. He didn’t bail out on his team late in the 2018-19 season. Those Celtics just didn’t have enough.
Nonsense. He wasn’t on the same page as Brad Stevens. He didn’t have much of a relationship with Jaylen Brown. Quit is probably too strong of a word but talk to enough people around that 2018-19 team and it’s clear there’s a belief that late in the season, Irving checked out. In the fall of ’18, Irving grabbed a mic and told a giddy Garden crowd he intended to re-sign there. By the spring, he was gone.
On Sunday, Irving talked about how he better understands leadership. In Boston, he struggled with it. Irving was the only member of the Celtics core with a championship, a status he was known to wield like a cudgel. He knew what it took to win—and he had the ring to prove it. During one locker room discussion, sources told SI, it was pointed out that Al Horford won two championships at Florida. Not the same, Irving said. A Boston assistant was part of a championship staff in Europe. Not the same, he replied. Aron Baynes, a reserve center on the Celtics 2018-19 team who won a title with San Antonio, wasn’t in the room for the exchange. At least one ex-teammate wonders what Irving would have said if he was.
Things never fully clicked for Irving (11) in Boston. / Jeremy Brevard-USA TODAY Sports
In Dallas, things are different. Throughout the organization, respect for Irving runs deep. He has been an extension of Jason Kidd on the floor. He has been a calming influence off of it. He has figured out how to succeed opposite Luka Dončić, creating an all-time great duo in the process. When Irving returned from a leg injury in January, team officials marveled at the effort Irving was putting in on the defensive end of the floor.
Asked about the skepticism of Irving’s fit in Dallas, Kidd said, “It’s alright to be wrong.”
Some of it is Irving, at 32, facing reality. He has played on three teams in the last six seasons. Four in the last eight. Cleveland, Boston, Brooklyn—Vesuvius left less wreckage. When Irving hit free agency last summer, Dallas was the only team offering real money to sign him.
Some of it is Dallas. The warm Texas climate and its right leaning politics. “He still will have his opinions of what he thinks,” said Kidd. “And here with the Mavs, we support that.” In Kidd, Irving has found a peer. Irving grew up watching Kidd in New Jersey. When Irving was in high school, they connected at a Nike event. “He was pretty good,” said Kidd. Inside the Dallas locker room, the bond between Irving and Kidd is ironclad.
“Just being able to talk the truth or speak the truth to one another,” said Kidd. “I compliment him for trusting me. I'm only here to tell him the truth and to try to help him achieve his goals.”
Kidd knows what it’s like to be a villain in Boston, his Nets years filled with fierce Celtics battles. Kidd was fueled by the hate. At times, Irving has seemed rattled by it. Irving has faced the Celtics 10 times since the 2021 playoffs. He has lost each one. He has had several dustups with fans, admitting in ‘22 that the crass attacks were “about so much you can take as a competitor.” It was bad then. It will be worse now.
“I’m at a place in my life where I don’t consider those past moments,” Irving told ESPN. “I was able to unpack them in a healthy way [and] move forward as a person. I had a rough time there when I was in Boston, dealing with a death in my family and a lot of off-court stuff that I wasn’t ready to handle. Now that I’m in a great place to be able to vocalize how I’m feeling, I’m ready to go back into Boston and have fun with my teammates.”
Fun? That’s up to Irving. Dallas needs a poised Irving. A composed one. This will be a difficult series. The Celtics are 2–0 against the Mavericks this season. They beat them by nine before the trades that brought P.J. Washington and Daniel Gafford to Dallas. They beat them by 28 after. They have elite defenders, dynamic wing scorers and will likely have a healthy Kristaps Porziņģis when the series begins next week.
“They have a lot of talented players,” said Kidd. “They've been [to the Finals] before. They have the experience, they're well coached. This is another great test.”
They need Irving. Dončić will get his points. The All-NBA guard is enjoying one of the finest stretches of his career. But he will need help. He will need Irving to be the shot maker he was in the conference finals, where he averaged 27 points—including 36 in Game 5—on 49% shooting. The three-point shooter (42.3%) he has been in the playoffs. The All-Star-level sidekick he has been all season.
Irving is coming to Boston, and make no mistake: a hyped up Boston crowd will be waiting. The boos will be loud, the rhetoric nasty. It will be the most intense environment Irving has played in and this time, everything is at stake. A championship is within reach for Kyrie Irving. It’s the Celtics, it’s Boston standing in front of it.
Game 3 of the NBA Finals is crucial for the Dallas Mavericks, as a loss would all be seal their fate against the Boston Celtics in this series.
Trailing 2-0, Dallas is looking to avoid the dreaded 3-0 series deficit -- something no team has ever come back from in a seven-game series in the history of the league.
On the bright side for Dallas, oddsmakers have favored Luka Doncic and company at home in Game 3.
The spread in Game 3 has moved since Kristaps Porzingis was diagnosed with a torn medial retinaculum allowing dislocation of the posterior tibialis tendon on Tuesday.
Porzingis is officially questionable for Game 3, and oddsmakers have moved Dallas from -2 to -2.5 in this game since the Porzingis injury was announced.
Boston has fared well without Porzingis this postseason, but he clearly makes the Celtics a better team, especially after dropping 20 points on 8-of-13 shooting from the field in Game 1.
Can Dallas pick up a win at home to keep its chances to win the Finals alive?
Boston Celtics on the Road
Boston has dominated on the road in the playoffs, going 6-0 straight up against the Miami Heat, Cleveland Cavaliers and Indiana Pacers. Can it stay perfect against the Mavericks?
The C's are 22-22-3 against the spread on the road in the 2023-24 season overall, so their playoff performance has been even better.
Boston Celtics as Underdogs
This is just the fourth time this season that the Celtics are underdogs, and it's the first time in five months that they have been in this spot.
Boston is 1-2 against the spread as an underdog in the 2023-24 season. All of those games have come on the road.
Dallas Mavericks at Home
So far this season, Dallas is 25-24 against the spread at home, but that number is slightly better as a home favorite.
The Mavs are 19-17 against the spread as home favorites, although they have lost games at home in every series so far this postseason.
Teams Down 0-2 in Game 3
Dallas is down 0-2 in this series, but there is an interesting trend dating back to 2005 for these teams entering Game 3.
NBA teams down 0-2 at home since 2005:
• 91-47-1 first half ATS • 66-70-3 full game ATS
The first half trend has been even lately though, going just 13-14-1 1H ATS since 2020-21 (3-4 this year) pic.twitter.com/ecnq7LaJoo
However, the Celtics are the best team in the NBA against the spread in the first half this season, so bettors may want to be careful about having to lay points with Dallas, who is a slight favorite, in Game 3.
Odds refresh periodically and are subject to change.
If you or someone you know has a gambling problem and wants help, call 1-800-GAMBLER.
Returning to the Boston lineup for the first time in more than five weeks, Porzingis was outstanding, finishing Game 1 with 20 points (on 8 for 13 shooting), six rebounds and three blocks. Coming off the bench for the first time this season, Porzingis made an immediate impact, racking up 11 points in the first seven minutes, helping the Celtics build a 37–20 lead.
“Even if I have time off, I can jump right back in and I feel the same way,” Porzingis said. “I get to my spots, so whether it’s playoffs, regular season or whatever, I know how to do this. That’s it, just having that confidence, going out there whatever, first round or Finals, just going out there with full confidence and giving what I have to the team.”
As solid as Boston was during the conference playoffs—and the Celtics lost just one game after Porzingis went out in the first round with a calf injury—Porzingis’s return clearly makes Boston measurably better. Porzingis torched the Mavericks offensively, exploiting switches and forcing Dallas’s bigs to chase him beyond the three-point line. Defensively, Porzingis was a menace; the shots he didn’t block he contested and on screens he all but dared the Mavs wing players to take the ball to the rim.
“He was great for them,” Mavericks star guard Luka Doncic said. “He was knocking down shots. He was blocking shots. So he was really, really huge for them on both ends of the floor.”
As thrilled as the Celtics were to get Porzingis back, the 7’2” big man was happier to be there. He received a loud ovation when he came out to warm up hours before the game. And the crowd exploded when Porzingis popped up on the JumboTron making the walk down the back hallway and onto the floor.
“Getting that kind of support was unreal,” Porzingis said. “The adrenaline was pumping through my veins and that definitely helped. Obviously, it wasn’t ideal that I was out for such a long time, but I did everything I could to prepare mentally for this moment coming back. And it paid off and we got the job done tonight and had a good game and [I’m] happy about the result.”
Entering this series, the Celtics believed they were uniquely equipped to defend Doncic. They had two All-Defensive Team members (Jrue Holiday and Derrick White) and Jaylen Brown, who probably deserved to be on one. Doncic got his points (30 on 12 for 26 shooting) but finished the game with one assist, his lowest total of the season. The lobs that powered Dallas’s offense in the conference finals? Gone. The corner threes? Taken away. The Mavericks’ nine assists were their lowest total of the season.
“They did a great job defending, making it tough on us,” Dallas head coach Jason Kidd said. “We had some good looks that didn’t go down. We’ve got to move the ball. The ball just stuck too much.”
Said Boston head coach Joe Mazzulla, “I thought our defensive mindset, our defensive execution, our defensive game plan, our positioning, we had the right intentions and I thought we played really physical, for the most part, defending without fouling.”
Doncic finished with 30 points but had only one assist, his lowest total of the season. / David Butler II-USA TODAY Sports
Credit Brown, who glued himself to Doncic for most of his 37 minutes. Brown has the size and strength to stay in front of Doncic and the discipline not to bite on any of his pump-fakes. By not sending double teams, Boston shut down the rest of the Dallas offense; when Kidd waved the white flag in the fourth quarter, only two other Mavericks (Kyrie Irving and P.J. Washington) had scored in double figures and neither had more than 14 points.
“What you saw tonight is kind of the challenge he took for himself coming into the year,” Mazzulla said. “Not wanting to be defined by one thing. Wanting to make plays. Wanting to be a well-rounded player and get better and better. So his spacing, his ball movement, his defense on ball and off ball.”
The much-talked-about hostility from the TD Garden crowd toward Irving never materialized; it’s tough to get too fired up when your team spent most of the game leading by double digits. Irving’s return to Boston was a dismal one: 12 points (on 6 for 19 shooting), two assists and three turnovers. While Irving had to contend with Holiday most of the night, the ex–All-Star missed a lot of open looks, including several beyond the three-point line and three in the third quarter, when Dallas briefly cut the lead to single digits.
“They really rely on their great defensive ball pressure and one-on-one defenders,” Irving said. “They funnel us into certain areas. Even as I say that, that they are relying on the one-on-one, every time I got an iso, there’s almost two, three people waiting for me to get in there. I have to catch the ball on a live dribble and just be aware of my opportunities.”
The Celtics have been burying opponents in three-pointers all season, finishing first in the league in attempts (42.5 per game) and second in percentage (38.8%). In Game 1, the Celtics were 7 for 15 from three-point range in the first quarter, helping build the double-digit lead they wouldn’t surrender.
Hauser had a rough conference finals, connecting on 12.5% of his shots and making just one three in a four-game sweep of the Indiana Pacers. He shook that off in Game 1, collecting eight points and making both of his three-point attempts. When Dallas went Hauser-hunting in the first half, he responded, locking up Doncic on two possessions and forcing Irving into a missed three.
Hauser shook off a rough conference finals to post a solid outing in Game 1 of the Finals. / David Butler II-USA TODAY Sports
NBA commissioner Adam Silver didn’t provide one at his annual pre-Finals news conference. Silver declined to comment on reports the NBA had agreed to the framework of deals with ESPN, NBC and Amazon while passing on a specific question about whether or not Warner Bros. Discovery—the parent company for longtime NBA broadcast partner Turner—had the right to match any deal.
“It’s complicated for several reasons,” Silver said. “One is the advent of new platforms, particularly streaming, and the interest of streaming companies, and then the traditional media companies also carrying our games on streaming platforms. It’s complicated with multiple partners all seeking similar assets. In many cases, just figuring out the right way to balance those games as they go to different partners.
“We tend to do long-term deals. We think that’s good for the stability of the league, but it means, to a certain extent, you’re trying to predict the future, which is, of course, impossible. So part of it is a bet on the partners that we will ultimately align with and their ability also to adjust with the times and their willingness to continue to invest in media and also become global, which is very important to the league as well.”
