The top two teams on the latest odds to win the NBA championship at sportsbooks monitored by OddsShark.com will meet on the hardwood Thursday night as the Toronto Raptors look to extend their win streak to seven games when they play host to the Golden State Warriors.
Toronto’s sensational start to the season continued this week with a pair of wins, capped by Tuesday’s 122-114 victory in Memphis that lifted the club’s league-leading straight-up record to 18-4 going into Thursday’s Warriors vs. Raptors betting matchup at Scotiabank Arena.
With their triumph over the Grizzlies as 5.5-point road chalk, the Raptors have further buried the memory of a recent three-game straight-up slide while cementing the team’s position as plus-850 second favourites on the NBA championship odds.
The Raptors have regularly piled on the offence during their 6-0 straight-up run, scoring 122 or more points in five of their past six outings, and have claimed victory by a double-digit margin on four occasions. That has paid dividends to bettors taking the OVER on the totals, which has paid out in four straight overall and in nine of the team’s 11 home dates this season.
However, Toronto has also regularly surrendered big point totals, allowing 111 points per game over its past four outings, and 110 or more points in five of the club’s past 10, contributing to an uneven 5-5 against the spread run.
The Warriors make the trip north of the border after closing out a four-game homestand with a 116-110 win over the Orlando Magic as seven-point chalk on Tuesday night. With the win, Golden State has now tallied three straight straight-up victories, but has struggled to pay out at the sportsbooks, where the team has gone a dismal 2-9 against the spread in its past 11 games.
That stretch also featured a four-game straight-up slide that marked the Warriors’ longest losing streak since February 2013, and has left Golden State in a tight three-way race with the Denver Nuggets and Los Angeles Clippers for top spot in the Western Conference standings.
But despite their recent struggles the Warriors, who are hoping to get star guard Stephen Curry (groin) back in the lineup on Thursday night, continue to dominate on the NBA futures, where they remain perched as heavy minus-240 chalk to win the conference and short minus-150 favourites to claim their fourth NBA title in five years.
Golden State has also dominated in clashes with the Raptors in recent years. Toronto has dropped eight straight to the defending champions, including four straight-up losses on home court, but has regularly covered the spread during that stretch, going 4-1-1 against the spread in its past six meetings with the Warriors according to the OddsShark NBA Database.
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