The home stretch of the NBA season was tough sledding for bettors. While some teams jockeyed for playoff seeding, others were more focused on load management or potential NBA draft positioning. That made things tricky on a night-to-night basis trying to decipher the level of motivation for certain teams.
Thankfully, the guessing games are over as the intensity will pick up significantly on Tuesday and Wednesday when the NBA holds its first-ever play-in tournament. For the first time, four teams from each conference will duke it out to secure the No. 7 and 8 seeds in the East and West for the playoffs.