Golden State Warriors vs. Houston Rockets Game 3: Prediction, Betting Odds For 2018 NBA Playoffs

The Houston Rockets are doing their best to make the 2018 Western Conference Finals a competitive series. They got 41 points from NBA MVP favorite James Harden in a Game 1 loss to the Golden State Warriors and scored 127 points in a dominant Game 2 victory at home.

Giving themselves hope with a split at Toyota Center, Houston faces a new challenge Sunday night. The Rockets will head on the road for Game 3 against the defending champs, looking to do what no team has been able to do in the last year: beat the Warriors at Oracle Arena in the playoffs.

Since Golden State signed Kevin Durant as a response to losing Game 7 of the 2016 NBA Finals at home, they’ve gone 25-4 in the postseason. Each one of those losses has come in a different series, and none of them occurred in Oakland, California, where Durant and the Warriors have a perfect 15-0 record.

No team has come particularly close to ending that unbeaten streak. It looked like the San Antonio Spurs might take Game 1 of last year’s conference finals until Kawhi Leonard got hurt and the Warriors squeaked out a two-point win. Ten of Golden State’s 15 home postseason wins have come by double digits, and they have outscored their opponents by an average of 15.5 points per game.

Houston has accomplished what each of Golden State’s first two playoff opponents were able to do. The Spurs took Game 4 in San Antonio before being eliminated in Game 5 of the conference quarterfinals. The Pelicans blew out the Warriors in Game 3 at New Orleans before losing the next two games by a combined 35 points.

When the Warriors get back in front of their home crowd, they could go back to looking like an unbeatable juggernaut that seems destined to win a third championship in four years.

P.J. Tucker and Eric Gordon combined to go 11-15 from three-point range in Game 2. Stephen Curry and Klay Thompson combined to score 24 points on 30 field-goal attempts. The numbers for all four players could look very different in Game 3.

That especially goes for Curry, who had a particularly rough shooting night. A couple of subpar performances have raised speculation the point guard is still feeling the effects of his knee injury, though that shouldn’t be the case after he had nearly six weeks of rest.

Golden State was careful not to rush Curry back too soon. He made 15 of his 34 three-point attempts last round when he made his return, and he could be in for a big night Sunday.

If Curry and Durant both play well, that might be too much for Houston to survive.

Through two games, it’s abundantly clear that Durant can get just about any shot he wants on offense. He scored 37 points in the series opener and added 38 points in Game 2, making 55.1 percent of his field goals and shooting six-of-13 from three-point range.

Even with Harden and Chris Paul, Houston probably won’t have enough firepower to match the Warriors when their stars are playing well. The Game 3 betting odds favor Golden State by seven points, according to OddsShark, and the Warriors could cover that line comfortably when they return home.

Game 3 Prediction: Golden State over Houston, 125-110