The Daily Sweat: Kevin Durant sent the Milwaukee Bucks' NBA title odds into a freefall
The Milwaukee Bucks were sitting pretty at halftime on Wednesday night.
The Bucks had a 16-point lead over the Brooklyn Nets and it sure felt like the second half of Game 5 could be a formality. Was Milwaukee really going to win its third consecutive game of the series and head home with a chance to clinch?
By now, you know that Kevin Durant answered that question with a hearty “no.” Durant had 49 points on 16-of-23 shooting and had 17 rebounds and 10 assists as the Nets outscored the Bucks by 10 in the third quarter and 12 in the fourth to win 114-108 and take a 3-2 series lead.
The second half was an abject disaster for the Bucks. It’s one thing if the Nets come back with huge performances from both James Harden and Durant. But Harden was just 1-of-10 from the field and had five points. It was Jeff Green who instead played the second fiddle to Durant. He was 7-of-8 from three and had 27 points.
As the Bucks had their 16-point lead at halftime, BetMGM responded appropriately. Milwaukee’s odds dropped to +325 to win the NBA title after they dominated Brooklyn in the first half.
Those odds have now more than tripled.
Bucks were +325 favorites to win NBA Championship at halftime.
Bucks now +1000, only Hawks have longer odds. (@BetMGM)— John Ewing (@johnewing) June 16, 2021
If you have faith that the Bucks can somehow win Games 6 and 7 to win the series, then you need to jump all over these odds. But it’s hard to see how Milwaukee can pull off two wins in two games after what happened on Wednesday night. The Bucks had the Nets on the ropes at home with a hobbled Harden and no Irving. Instead, Durant put on his Superman cape and Giannis and the rest of the Bucks were incapable of stopping him.
Is a win on Thursday night possible? Absolutely, according to oddsmakers. The Bucks opened as 3.5-point favorites for Game 6 with an over/under set at 220.5. The Bucks are even -160 straight up on the money line.
It’s easy to envision a Game 7 in Brooklyn on Saturday night. But if Durant is going to do what he did in Game 5, he’s going to have something similar on tap for an encore in Game 7.
Get your U.S. Open bets in before the tournament starts
The US Open starts on Thursday. Jon Rahm is the big favorite at +900. He’s the only player with odds below +1600.
Yahoo Sports’ Jay Busbee broke down everything you need to know about betting the U.S. Open earlier in the week. We’re partial to Xander Schauffele (+1800) potentially getting his first major win or Justin Thomas (+2200) getting his putting straightened out and being in contention over the weekend.
Betting Euro 2020
We’re on a bad run of form on our picks after a hot start. Fading us is the right way to go at this point.
The second round of group stage games gets underway on Wednesday as Group A and half of Group B play their second games of the tournament. Italy is a big favorite against Switzerland on Wednesday afternoon and Wales and Turkey play an intriguing game at Noon ET. Wales got a point against the Swiss to open the tournament while Turkey lost 3-0 to Italy. Turkey needs a win to have more than a long shot of making the knockout rounds.
The over/under is just 1.5 for Wales and Turkey. If you think the game is going to finish 0-0 or 1-0 you can get the under at +140. The over is at -200. That’s the lowest over/under odds we’ve seen at any point this tournament.
There’s other soccer to bet
Copa America is going on at the same time as Euro 2020. The tournament has been plagued by coronavirus cases as COVID-19 is raging throughout South America. The tournament was moved to Brazil because of COVID-19 and other factors and Venezuela played Brazil in its first game of the tournament with myriad members of the team missing because of COVID-19.
The tournament is set up oddly. Ten teams are participating in two groups of five. Eight teams make the quarterfinals, meaning that each team is playing four group games just for two teams to miss out on the knockout rounds.
Thursday night features games between Colombia and Venezuela and Brazil and Peru. Colombia is a -350 favorite and Brazil is at -450. The over/under is at 2.5 goals for both; the over is -155 in Brazil vs. Peru.
Who cashed tickets on Tuesday?
If you had Brooklyn on Tuesday night you were in luck. The Bucks opened as four-point favorites but the number went down to one before tipoff with Harden’s return. The Nets ended up covering that fairly easily thanks to the second half comeback.
France bettors did well against Germany as the French (+160) won 1-0 against the Germans thanks to an own goal in the first half. France scored twice in the second half but both goals were called back because of offsides.
Portugal also easily beat Hungary 3-0. A late goal from Cristiano Ronaldo hit the over and bettors who had Portugal to win to nil (+110) were happy campers.
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