Free Pick | NBA | Wednesday | Oct. 30

Nelly’s will start our basketball season officially in the next few days – we went 48-30 in the NBA regular season last year as part of another excellent hoops season.

#560 Golden State Warriors -2.5 over New Orleans Pelicans 9:10 PM CT

The Pelicans and Warriors play on back-to-back nights in San Francisco with Golden State winning 124-106 last night. It can be tempting to play on the team that lost in these situations, but the Pelicans shot over 54 percent last night, a figure that will be tough to match in the rematch. Golden State did have an edge in 3-point shooting with both teams having success beyond the arc, but the biggest disparity was a 24-8 edge in turnovers for the Warriors, something that isn’t likely to dramatically shift overnight. New Orleans is 2-2 but this will now be a fourth road game in a row over the span of just six days for a grueling early season path. Herbert Jones left last night’s game while Trey Murphy is out, as this won’t be a complete Pelicans group. Of course, the Warriors are also shorthanded with Steph Curry and Andrew Wiggins out, but new addition Buddy Hield stepped up with 28 points last night while the Warriors have shown better depth than expected despite many of the team’s contributors not yet being household names. Moses Moddy and Brandin Podziemski in particular have provided excellent results so far this season in increased roles. The Warriors are 59-30 S/U at home since the start of the 2022-23 season including 20-10-1 ATS when dogged or favored by four or fewer points which accounts for a lot of games Curry has missed.