March 5 NBA Player Props – Over/Unders and Picks for Heat vs 76ers, Warriors vs Lakers

• Six games are on Saturday’s NBA schedule
• The top team in the Eastern Conference meet with the Sixers in Miami
• The slumping Lakers take on Steph Curry and the Golden State Warriors in Los Angeles

It’s a relatively early start for NBA fans on Saturday with the Kings and Mavericks tipping off at 5:10pm ET. Dallas is coming into this one on a three-game winning run, and is favored comfortably. Struggling Charlotte host the Spurs a couple of hours later before a trio of 8:10pm ET tip offs.

Philadelphia and Miami, the top two teams in the Eastern Conference, meet in Florida with the Sixers on the second night of a back-to-back. Memphis is eyeing the two seed in the Western Conference as they face the Magic, a game they are listed as 15.5-point favorites for. Minnesota, who hold top six aspirations, take on the tanking Blazers.

The night is wrapped up with the latest edition of the Steph Curry versus LeBron James rivalry, albeit in very different circumstances to previous iterations. The Dubs are six-point favorites in Los Angeles with the Lakers having lost four in a row.

NBA Player Props – March 5th

Odds as of March 5th at FanDuel.

Ja Morant, who is surging in NBA MVP odds, has the highest points line in Saturday’s games at 32.5 against the rebuilding Magic.

Lakers Can’t Stop Steph

The Lakers have a below-average defense over the last 10 games. They are a team in disarray, where even the concept of chemistry is long gone. Defensive effort has been particularly woeful over the last few games, leading to brutal blowout wins at the hands of the Pelicans and Clippers.

This should be a good time to face the Warriors. There’s still no Draymond Green, and the Dubs are enduring their own slump of sorts. Steph Curry is having the worst shooting season of his career.

Despite that, the points line of 24.5 seems low for the two-time MVP. Curry has scored 25+ in five of his last eight. While the Lakers have kept him to 24 and 21 in the previous meetings, their aggressive defensive schemes against Curry are not going to be effective if their effort is as lackluster on Saturday evening.

Curry is averaging 27.1 points per game over the last eight. He could easily cash this over in the three quarters.

• Pick: Steph Curry over 24.5 points (-116)

Bane’s Continued Struggles

Desmond Bane is averaging exactly 17.5 points for the season. That number drops to 15.2 over the last 10, however, with Ja Morant’s points scoring explosion seeing Bane take a bit of a back seat. He’s also in a slump by his high standards, shooting under 37% from the field in that period.

Memphis is heavy favorites on Saturday against the Magic, and understandably so. Orlando has sneakily been a top eight defense over the last eight, though, and they have some decent defensive options on the perimeter to trouble Bane’s shot. Despite draining five threes against Boston a couple of days ago, there are some concerns that Bane is suffering from a bit of fatigue after such a heavy workload this season.

Bane has scored 17 or fewer in the last four and eight of the last 11. A potential Memphis blowout would limit his minutes and scoring or it could just be another cold shooting night.

There’s good reason to go with the under here — Bane only scored seven when these teams last met.

Pick: Desmond Bane under 17.5 points (-112)