This one is a high-scoring home team against an offence that has nothing left in the tank. Chiba can light it up from three and leak points at home, but Osaka, with its injury list, has not shown a ceiling above the low seventies. When a team like that meets a heavy favourite, the game usually gets decided early and then just runs down the clock. How many points end up on the board depends far more on Osaka than on Chiba.
Chiba win by shooting. At Saga they made 19 threes and scored 111 in overtime, and their home games this season have been shootouts because the defence lets opponents score too. But those home totals came against good attacks: Toyama, Kyoto, the Sunrockers. Osaka is a different kind of opponent. Saiz, Dodd, Hashimoto and Goda have all been out since late October, and in the five games since, Osaka scored 71, 65, 60, 60 and 68. Those five games finished with 166, 152, 153, 162 and 154 total points.
The direct meeting just over two weeks ago fits the pattern. Chiba won 87-65 in Osaka with fifteen made threes, and the game still ended at 152 points. Osaka shot 24 of 77 from the field, lost the boards 37 to 51 and gave Chiba a lot of long, empty possessions to defend.
The key matchups are Chiba's shooters, Tashiro, Kanechika, Hara and Togashi, against an Osaka perimeter that has given up 14 to 16 threes, and Chiba's glass, led by Maye, against Osaka's thin frontcourt. Both favour Chiba on the scoreboard, but neither speeds the game up. Osaka's offence runs almost entirely through James Palmer Jr., back for one game with 23 points on 4 of 14 from three, and the team shoots 62 percent at the line.
Two import bigs come back in this game, Costello for Chiba and Gerun for Osaka, and neither has played yet this season. Nate Williams was already missing from Chiba's last game, so his injury-list move changes nothing.
I expect Chiba to build a lead in the first half and then start giving bench players minutes, while Osaka grinds its way into the sixties. For the total to get high, both teams would have to hit the top of their ranges on the same night, and Osaka's current group hasn't done that once. That's why I'm on the under in this match.
