NBA Finals Betting Preview

It seemed inevitable that the Boston Celtics would be here. After putting together one of the best basketball teams ever assembled, the Celtics will try to win a record-breaking 18th championship when they meet the Dallas Mavericks in the 2024 NBA Finals. Game 1 is Thursday night at the TD Garden, tipping off at 8:30 PM ET.

The Mavericks are no pushovers, though. They’ve built a super team of their own, albeit with less bench strength than their Boston counterparts. Either team would be a deserving champion – but who should you put your money on at Bodog Sportsbook? Our NBA finals betting preview has all the answers.

Celtics Favoured to Win Title – and Game 1

As expected, the Celtics are favoured to win the title as we go to press. They’re available at –210 on the NBA Playoffs series prices at Bodog Sportsbook, with the Mavericks checking in as the +175 underdogs.

Boston is also the 6.5-point favourite on the NBA odds board for Thursday’s opener, with a total of 214.5 points. The C’s have home-court advantage for this series, having amassed the top regular-season record in the league at 64-18 (41-36-5 ATS) to earn the No. 1 overall playoff seed. They’ll host Games 1 and 2, then Games 5 and 7 if necessary.

The Mavericks (50-32 SU, 48-34 ATS), meanwhile, will host Games 3 and 4 at the American Airlines Center, then Game 6 if necessary. They’re the No. 5 seed in the Western Conference despite winning the Southwest Division – and posting the most profitable betting record in the West.

Route to the Final

The Celtics may have had the easiest path to the NBA Finals since the format expanded to 16 teams in 1984. Each of their three opponents from the Eastern Conference had major injury concerns; it all started with the Miami Heat, who were swept aside 4-1 in the first round without the services of Jimmy Butler and Terry Rozier.

Next up were the Cleveland Cavaliers, minus centre Jarrett Allen for the duration and Donovan Mitchell for the last two games. Boston took their Eastern semi-final 4-1 to set up what looked like a promising conference final with the Indiana Pacers, and while Indiana kept it close for the most part, they were swept 4-0 after Tyrese Haliburton injured his hamstring in Game 2.

Things were much more interesting for Dallas in the West – although they also had the benefit of good health. Without Kawhi Leonard, the Los Angeles Clippers were no match for the Mavericks in Round 1, losing 4-2 after falling apart in the last two games.

The Mavs had an even tougher second-round opponent in the Oklahoma City Thunder, the top seed from the West, and the Thunder were about as healthy as a team could hope for heading into the postseason. This Western semi-final was an instant classic; Dallas managed to win in six despite the heroics of Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, who looked very strong for OKC ahead of Team Canada’s trip to the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris.

Finally, and perhaps most impressively, the Mavericks put away a Minnesota Timberwolves team that had just made a big impression by eliminating the defending champion Denver Nuggets in the Western semis. Minnesota tried the same bully tactics against the Mavs, but Dallas held firm and won in five after putting a 3-0 stranglehold on the series.

Star Players

For the past five years, the Celtics have been defined by the 1-2 wing combo of Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown. Tatum has been talked up as an MVP candidate, and Brown is a three-time All-Star, but both players are somewhat over-rated given their actual production levels.

On the flip side, Kristaps Porzingis has played arguably the best basketball of his career since joining Boston in the offseason. Porzingis would have made a better All-Star selection this year than Brown – and for that matter, Derrick White and Al Horford were superior performers as well.

Then you have point guard Jrue Holiday. The Milwaukee Bucks thought they were building a super team when they acquired Damian Lillard from the Portland Trail Blazers, but Portland ended up flipping Holiday to the Celtics for Malcom Brogdon, Robert Williams III and two first-round picks.

This was the difference-maker for Boston. While the Bucks struggled to gain a foothold in the East with Lillard replacing Holiday, the Celtics rode the superior defence of both Holiday and White, dominating the East in a way that we haven’t seen since the days of Larry Bird, Kevin McHale, Robert Parish and Danny Ainge.

But what if we told you that Dallas has the best two players in this series? Luka Doncic was an MVP finalist this year, and he played like it against the Timberwolves, scoring over 30 points in each of their four victories while posting a triple-double in Games 2 and 4.

Now that he’s 32 years old and somewhat distracted by off-court matters, it might be a bit of a stretch to rank Kyrie Irving ahead of Tatum at this point. However, Irving has managed to remain somewhat healthy and free of controversy in his first full season with Dallas. And Irving is peaking at just the right time, also hitting the 30-point mark in three games versus Minnesota.

The big question for the Mavs is whether they have enough star power beyond Doncic and Irving to compete with Boston. The world hasn’t quite caught on yet to how well centre Daniel Gafford has played for Dallas since coming over from the Washington Wizards ahead of the trade deadline. Gafford has been more than just a viable back-up for Derrick Lively II, who finished sixth in Rookie of the Year voting.

Head Coach Profile

It’s difficult to gauge just how effective a head coach Joe Mazzulla is for the Celtics. He wasn’t the first choice for this job; Mazzulla was an assistant on Ime Udoka’s staff, then took over as interim coach for the 2022-23 campaign when Udoka was suspended and eventually let go.

To be fair, Mazzulla did get promoted to full status in February 2023, and was named a finalist for Head Coach of the Year after guiding Boston to the No. 2 seed in the East. But the 35-year-old might be more properly viewed as an extension of team president Brad Stevens, who established himself as one of the top coaches in the league before moving upstairs in 2021 to take over from Ainge as the team’s architect – and earning Executive of the Year honours this season.

It’s even more difficult to pin down just how important Mavericks head coach Jason Kidd has been to his team’s success. Kidd was one of the best point guards of all time, but his early coaching tenure with the Brooklyn Nets and the Bucks was marked by disappointment and palace intrigue.

After winning a title as an assistant with the 2019-20 Los Angeles Lakers, Kidd’s profile had been rebuilt enough for Dallas to hire their former star player as their head coach in 2021, following the resignation of Rick Carlisle (now with Indiana). Kidd has been credited with helping the Mavs carve out a more defensive-minded identity, one that has seen them reach the Final Four in back-to-back years.

Ultimately, Mazzulla and Kidd are both avatars for the team’s they coach, establishing the culture that allows their players to perform at the highest possible level. That might be a more important skill these days than drawing the X’s and O’s.

Previous Title Wins

That 2020 championship for the Lakers put them in a tie with Boston for the most in NBA history, so you can imagine how hungry the C’s are to get their record back. This was the pre-eminent franchise in pro basketball starting in the late 1950s when they won the first of eight consecutive titles, led by Bill Russell, Bob Cousy and head coach Red Auerbach.

That success carried through into the 1970s, although titles were harder to come by in the post-expansion era. The Celtics won in 1974 and again in 1976, with John Havlicek and Dave Cowens on the floor and former star forward Tommy Heinsohn – the future voice of the team on commentary – as head coach.

Chances are you first became aware of the Celtics through their rivalry with the Lakers, especially after Bird and Magic Johnson became household names. Boston won the championship in 1981, 1984 and 1986, beating Los Angeles for the second of those titles in one of the greatest NBA Finals in history.

Or maybe you’re more familiar with the 2007-08 Celtics – the last team from Boston to hoist the Larry O’Brien Championship Trophy. That was the team with Paul Pierce, Kevin Garnett and Ray Allen, coached by Doc Rivers to the title over Kobe Bryant’s Lakers.

It wouldn’t be until 2011 that Dallas won their first and only NBA championship. They joined the league in 1980 and enjoyed limited success before taking Dirk Nowitzki ninth overall in the 1998 NBA Draft, one spot ahead of Pierce and four after Toronto Raptors legend Vince Carter.

Sadly, Nowitzki didn’t quite get the Mavs over the hump in his first go-around with Canada’s own Steve Nash as his point guard. But with Kidd at the helm, and talented role players like Tyson Chandler, Jason Terry and Shawn Marion, Dallas stunned the world by defeating LeBron James and the Heat in the 2011 NBA Finals.

It’s been fairly quiet for the Mavericks since that title, and since Nowitzki’s retirement in 2019. While the Celtics have made multiple deep playoff runs, including all the way to the 2022 Finals, Dallas has been trying to find the right supporting cast for Doncic, the third overall pick in the 2018 Draft.

They may have found it. The Mavericks figure to be the toughest test Boston will have faced in these playoffs, and from a betting perspective, the underdogs have all the value – especially with Porzingis missing the past 10 games with a strained right calf, and his status yet to be confirmed for Game 1.

Then again, this might be the best Celtics team of all-time, at least on paper. And that’s saying something given this franchise’s history.

It’s time to put your money where your mouth is. We have over 300 different ways to bet on Thursday’s opener here at Bodog Sportsbook, and our NBA Finals betting preview should have given you all the ammunition you need. We host dozens of Luka Doncic props and Jayson Tatum props, so check out our NBA odds page for the latest lines, and enjoy the finals.

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