There’s no denying that there’s a home court advantage in the NBA. In this article, we’re going to take a look at how home teams perform Against The Spread (ATS) in the NBA. We’ll answer the question about whether or not it’s profitable to blindly bet home teams to cover ATS.
Do NBA Teams Win More at Home?
NBA teams definitely win more at home. If you look at this year’s standings (2019/20), 17 teams have a losing record, but only 11 teams have a losing record at home in the NBA this season.
Here’s the win/loss record in home games for the last three seasons:
535-433 (55.27%) – 2019/20 Season
772-537 (58.98%) – 2018/19 Season
769-540 (58.75%) – 2017/18 Season
As you can see, home teams definitely win more than they lose in the NBA.
ATS Record for Home Teams in the NBA
We’ve deduced that home teams have the edge in the NBA when it comes to winning. However, let’s take a look at how well home teams are performing against the spread in the NBA.
When making NBA picks against the spread, should you blindly tail home teams?
Here’s the data on betting home teams ATS:
464-482-22 (49.05%) – 2019/20 Season
654-637-18 (50.66%) – 2018/19 Season
621-659-29 (48.52%) – 2017/18 Season
If you don’t already know, you need to hit 52.38% of your bets to break even at -110 odds. This is the standard vig on point spread bets and over/under bets in the NBA.
Betting on home teams blindly ATS is unprofitable.
In the last three seasons, there wasn’t a single season where it was profitable to flat bet all home teams to cover Against the Spread.
This goes to show you how well National Basketball Association oddsmakers set the lines. If it was as simple as betting on every home team to make a profit, everyone would be doing it and making lots of money. But that is obviously not the case.
While flat betting every home team in the NBA to cover ATS isn’t going to work, there are certain teams in the league that have a bigger home court advantage and you should target them.
One of the best home teams the last two years have been the Bucks. Milwaukee have gone 48-30-2 ATS (61.54%) in the last two seasons at home, easily posting a profit for backers.
There’s no such thing as guaranteed NBA picks. You have to put in the work to find profitable trends to target. It’s important to backtest your strategies to determine the potential profitability.
I also recommend looking at alternative ATS markets. The betting limits may be smaller, but the lines aren’t as sharp and you can likely identify trends once you start analyzing the statistics/data.
NBA betting is growing in popularity every year as of late and the league is only growing. There are plenty of ways to attack an NBA game. Don’t limit yourself to full game straight bets.
