Brooklyn Nets at Chicago Bulls odds, picks and prediction

The Brooklyn Nets (34-15) visit the Windy City Sunday for an early afternoon game against the Chicago Bulls (19-28) at United Center. Tip-off will be at 2 p.m. ET. Below, we analyze the Nets-Bulls odds and lines, with NBA picks and predictions.

Brooklyn has won four straight games, six of seven and 12 of its last 14 games but is just 5-19 against the spread in those contests.

The Nets’ only loss in the past two weeks was against current the Western Conference’s top-seeded Utah Jazz by a 118-88 score March 24 without any of their Big 3.

Chicago has lost six games in a row and eight of its last nine games while going 4-5 ATS. The past four Bulls losses were on a four-game Western Conference road trip with the latest being a 113-106 loss to the Jazz as 11-point underdogs Friday.

Nets at Bulls: Odds, spread and lines

Odds via BetMGM; access USA TODAY Sports’ betting odds for a full list. Lines last updated at 9 a.m. ET.

Money line: Nets -150 (bet $150 to win $100) | Bulls +125 (bet $100 to win $125)
Against the spread/ATS: Nets -3 (-110) | Bulls +3 (-110)
Over/Under: 225.5 (O: -110 | U: -110)

Nets at Bulls: Key injuries

Nets

SG James Harden (hamstring) out
SF Kevin Durant (hamstring) out

Bulls

SG Zach LaVine (ankle) probable
PG Coby White (neck) probable
SG Garrett Temple (hamstring) out

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Nets at Bulls: Odds, lines, predictions and picks

Prediction

Bulls 114, Nets 107

Money line (ML)

Newly acquired Bulls C Nikola Vucevic has played the Nets three times already this season while with the Orlando Magic, and he has balled out.

Vucevic is averaging 28 points per game on 49.3% shooting (40.7% from 3-point range) with 12.0 rebounds and 5.7 assists per game vs. the Nets this season.

Also, Brooklyn has one of its major edges dulled (offensive FTA/FG rate) with Harden being sidelined by injury.

Nets’ PG Kyrie Irving is in the bottom 36th percentile of guards in on-off court offensive free-throw rate, according to CleaningTheGlass.com, whereas Harden is in the top 95th percentile for guards.

“LEAN” toward BULLS (+125) for a quarter-unit.

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Against the spread (ATS)

Definitely bet BULLS +3 (-110) heavier than or instead of Chicago’s money line.

My guess is every team in the league looks forward to playing Brooklyn and the Nets will get every team’s best effort even in the regular season.

Adding to that, the Nets are starting to play down to their competition and are 0-5 ATS in their last five games vs. teams with losing records.

Over/Under (O/U)

PASS with a slight “lean” towards Under 225.5 (-110) because the Nets have played to the Under in three straight games and six of their last seven contests and the Bulls are 3-7 O/U in their last 10 games.

The dealbreaker is that the inconsistent Chicago offense should be able to execute against a Brooklyn team that seems like it doesn’t want to play defense every now and then.

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