In what is arguably the biggest NBA game on Christmas Day, we have the Houston Rockets taking on the Los Angeles Lakers!
Pressure is on both teams to perform after losing their last 2 games, this will be the first of three regular season meetings between the two teams.
Our Same Game Parlay pick includes both LeBron James and Kevin Durant.
Continue reading below to see it!
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CLAIM NOWApart from points, Kevin Durant has been very consistent in one other key area for the Rockets and that is rebounding. He’s averaging exactly 5 boards per game this season, going into Thursday’s game he’s got an active 5 game streak with at least 5 rebounds grabbed, with the highlight being the game against the Kings where he went for 10 of them. With this recent poor run of play that the Rockets are on (1 win in 5 games), I’m sure Durant will want to make amends by leading his team to a victory. Being 37 years old he might not get the opportunity to play many games on this day in his career, that should also be a motivating factor do well here. He’s cleared this line in 3 of his last 4 Christmas Day games, hopefully he adds to that vs a Lakers team that ranks 7th for Rebounds allowed to opposing small forwards.
This will be LeBron’s 20th game on Christmas Day and who knows, it might be the last one. If that’s the case then I’m sure James will want to put on a show one last time for all of his fans, he is the all-time leader in points scored on this special day with 507. Last year he went off for 31 against the Warriors, it was the 3rd time in 4 games on Christmas Day he surpassed the 30-point mark. Scoring on the Houston Rockets might prove to be difficult, but then again with the Lakers having Luka Doncic I’m sure he will make enough plays for his veteran to score here. In 11 games played his season LeBron is averaging 20.2 points per game, he has been on fire in back-to-back games vs the Clippers and Suns making 3 threes in both games. In his most recent meeting against the Rockets he knocked down 4 of them on 11 attempts, let’s back him to score an easy 20 points here.
Only Jack LaRavia has appeared in more games this season for the Lakers than Rui Hachimura. The sharpshooter has been a consistent threat to opposing teams from the three-point line, this season has seen Hachimura shoot the highest percentage from three-point land of his career so far at 45.6%. He is also knocking down an average of 1.9 threes per game which is also a career best, he is not the first player that has benefited playing alongside Luka Doncic. He’s cleared this line in 6 of 9 games played, while against Houston he’s done it twice in 4 meetings. The Rockets rank 6th in threes allowed to opposing SF this season. I feel very confident in his ability to add to this run on Christmas Day, in 11 home games this season he’s cleared this line 8 times which is a success rate of 73%.
