James Harden and the Houston Rockets will host Kemba Walker and the Boston Celtics on Tuesday. The Celtics are hopeful that Jaylen Brown (ankle) will be able to suit up after missing Sunday's game, but he was held out of Monday's practice. The Rockets will be without Eric Gordon (lower leg), but have a clean injury report otherwise.
Tip-off is set for 9:30 p.m ET from the Toyota Center. Sportsbooks list the Rockets as 2.5-point home favorites, while the over-under for total points scored is 232 in the latest Celtics vs. Rockets odds. Before you make any Rockets vs. Celtics picks or NBA predictions, you'll want to see what SportsLine's advanced computer model has to say.
The SportsLine Projection Model simulates every NBA game 10,000 times, and last season it returned a whopping $4,280 on its top-rated NBA spread and money line picks. It's already returned almost $3,000 in profit on all its top-rated NBA picks during the 2019-20 season and entered Week 17 on a blistering 35-19 run on all top-rated NBA spread picks. Anybody who has followed it has seen huge returns.
Now, the model has generated another strong against the spread pick for Celtics vs. Rockets on Tuesday. You can head to SportsLine to see it. Here are several NBA lines for Celtics vs. Rockets:
- Celtics vs. Rockets spread: Rockets -2.5
- Celtics vs. Rockets over-under: 232 points
- Celtics vs. Rockets money line: Houston -130, Boston +110
- BOS: Celtics have won seven-straight and are 5-2 ATS during that span
- HOU: Rockets have a bottom-10 cover rate (43.2 percent) as favorites
Why the Rockets can cover
The model is well aware that home court advantage has made a major difference for the Rockets this season. They're 18-8 with a plus-7.6 point differential at home, as opposed to 15-12 with a minus-0.4 point differential on the road.
The Celtics prefer to slow the pace, but Houston's recent move to a small ball lineup may not allow that. The Celtics are just 1-6 against the spread this season when the pace has been pushed to at least 104 possessions in a game, while Houston's average pace of play is 106.2, the second-fastest in the NBA.
With the addition of Robert Covington, the Rockets have the wings to give Jayson Tatum and Gordon Hayward trouble defensively, and their fourth-ranked pick and roll defense should make scoring tough for Walker.
Why the Celtics can cover
Just because the Rockets match up well against Boston doesn't mean they will cover the spread on Tuesday. The model is well aware that Boston has won seven straight in spite of multiple injuries. That win streak includes road victories over the Heat and Thunder as well as a 21-point home statement win over the Eastern Conference rival Philadelphia 76ers.
The model also knows that Boston has been undervalued by sports books all year. Only the Thunder have a better against the spread record than the Celtics, who have covered over 60 percent of the time this season. As underdogs, Boston has covered a whopping 73.3 percent of the time.
How to make Celtics vs. Rockets picks
SportsLine's model is leaning over on the total. In fact, it's projecting Harden for 36 points and expects a difference-making effort from Hayward. It also says one side of the spread hits in well over 50 percent of simulations. You can only see that one at SportsLine.
So who wins Celtics vs. Rockets? And which side of the spread cashes in well over 50 percent of the time? Visit SportsLine now to find out which side of the Celtics vs. Rockets spread you need to jump on Tuesday, all from the model on a 35-19 run on NBA picks, and find out.
