Donovan Mitchell can be one of the highest-volume shooters in the league, and I love backing him when the lights are the brightest. During a busy NBA season star players aren’t going to be locked in for every game, but it is easy to see why that won’t be the case here tomorrow. So far this season Mitchell has taken more of a team-focused mentality, but with plenty of blowouts early on, I don’t think he was in a rush to shoot. We’ve seen him come alive from a volume standpoint recently, posting:

7-13 vs CHI
5-13 vs PHI
7-16 vs CHI

He is averaging 3.8 threes on 9.0 attempts shooting an impressive 42% from beyond the arc on high volume. While he is normally in that 9+ range, seeing 13+ threes in three straight games gives me confidence he’s going to bring that volume into tonight’s prime-time matchup. With Isaac Okoro and Caris Levert injured in the guard room we could see some additional minutes as well.

While this game is stacked with star power on both sides of the floor, you could argue that Mobley will have the most important job on the floor.

Not only will he continue to have a strong offensive burden, but he will also play a big part in slowing down the Celtic’s dynamic duo on defence, with plenty of time guarding Jayson Tatum, who sits third on MVP voting at the moment. I really wouldn’t be surprised if Mobley’s offensive game took a dip in this one, with the focus being his defensive speciality.

He’s currently averaging 0.8 steals per game, recording a steal in 6 of 12 games he played at least 20 minutes in. While the Celtics aren’t the best matchup in the world for turnovers, an intense matchup with both teams getting out in transition scoring should create plenty of opportunities. After coming back from Illness he looked strong in his return, expect a full complement of minutes in a game they should be taking very seriously.

Jrue Holiday continues to be one of the most underrated players in the league. While he isn’t the flashiest guy in the world, he provides the stability and versatility this team needs, especially with two isolation-heavy creators like Tatum and Brown.

While they will have the ball in their hands plenty for playmaking purposes, we still see a lot of Jrue Holiday bringing the ball up the court and organising the offence. This isn’t the best scoring matchup for him either, with the Cavaliers being stingy on defence against the Guards, expect a lot of passes to the 3-point line from the veteran.

He’s averaging 4.0 assists on the season, but that actually takes a huge jump to 5.4 at home v 3.1 on the road. Those are some pretty drastic spikes to keep an eye out for, and probably correlate with the shooters playing better in their home stadium. He’s posted 4+ assists in 7 of his last 11 matchups, and 7 of 9 games where he played over 30 minutes. In a close competitive game, he should clock more than enough minutes to clear this fairly low bar.

The NBA Cup has given us arguably the best regular season matchup possible between the Cavaliers and the Celtics. With a dominant NBA title run last season, who could have predicted that the Cavaliers would be the undefeated team of the two, 15 games into the year?

Despite the historic start to the season, the market isn’t quite buying the hype with the Celtics still listed as 5.5-point favourites. A lot of that is thanks to Jayson Tatum, who is currently 3rd in MVP odds and has continued to show why he is one of the best players in the league, and I’m backing him tonight.

While his scoring is always an intriguing option, his rebounding sticks out the most here. He’s proven to be one of the best forward rebounders on the planet, averaging 8 on the season, and we tend to see those spike games against good defences that hone in on his scoring. The Cavaliers are currently allowing the second most rebounds to opposing PF’s, and it makes a lot of logical sense.

When you have Evan Mobley and Jarrett Allen down in the pain teams will need to match their size and bring extra bodies down, which creates even more rebound opportunities. I have Tatum projected for over 10+ rebounds tonight and love the volume here.

Jaylen Brown struggled to get out to a hot start this season after dealing with a lingering hip injury that kept him out of action for four games. He’s starting to finally look like himself, scoring at least 24 in three straight outings, including a season-high 37 against Atlanta.

Additionally, he’s been handling a huge workload, posting 43, 36, 36, 37, 37, 43, 38, and 38 minutes over his last 8 games. You normally only see that kind of usage for star players during the playoffs, but it’s hard to not expect him to match that tonight in such a big regular-season game.

While the Cavaliers are a good defence team, the way you beat them is versatility. Brown is not only dependable to knock down the open three’s but he’s also got the ability and willingness to get to the paint aggressively. You can also tell Brown was working on driving to the paint with both hands, after facing some heavy criticism for that part of his game not being developed.

The Cavaliers’ defence will have a clear plan for slowing down Tatum, which should lead to a game-script where Brown can absolutely ball out.