Pacers/Hornets Over 229.5
The Pacers are 0-4 SU & ATS since the All-Star break. That streak will eventually end. Tanking as they might be, these players and coaches have pride and will strive to stop the bleeding when they can.
The streak I think is less likely to end is how they are playing. Defensive big man Ivan Zubac has not yet played with his new team and will surely be slowly worked back from his ankle injury. In his place the Pacers are rolling out younger, more offensive-focused players, resulting in an incredibly high pace.
Since the AS break, the Pacers have a pace (possessions per team per game) of 108.9, an absurd number — 7 possessions more per team per game than the average team during this span. Only the other team recently fined by the league for trying to lose games too aggressively — the Utah Jazz — have a higher pace during this stretch at 109.
The Pacers’ games have gone 3-1 to the Over since the break, with Indiana allowing 133.3 points per game over their last three. That is not an accident. It is stylistic.
As we discussed in a recent Bettor Day research article: since 2023, bad teams (≤35% win percentage) have gone Over 59% of the time post–All-Star break when facing non-bad teams, and an even stronger 61.6% when facing the “middling” tier (36–50% win percentage).
Since the All-Star break, these uber-bad teams have gone 9-7 to the Over vs. non-bad teams and 4-3 to the Over vs. the middling teams outlined in the article (WP between 35 and 50).
The Hornets are a great example of this dynamic. They are not good enough defensively to shut down a team like the Pacers. But if they get behind, they are more than willing to take Indiana into an up-tempo game and let variance and superiority surface. That is exactly the environment we want for an Over.
Because of Pacers head coach Rick Carlisle's status as an unreproachable NBA lifer, Indiana is more willing — and more able — to execute the tanking strategy cleanly. We have seen this movie before in Indiana: when they pivot toward development, the pace spikes first. Only when they have something to protect does it moderate.
We have seen the sharper books in this market move to 230. Take advantage of the better number if you can find it — even some rogue 229s are still out there.
This profile fits the data. Bad team versus not-so-bad team. Both teams' incentives are aligned; expect the Hornets to eventually pull away in a high-pace, And-1-esque game of hoop.
PLAY: Pacers / Hornets Over 229.5.