Playoffs kick off in Philly!

The Philadelphia 76ers and Toronto Raptors will contest their Game 1 in the NBA Playoffs on 04/17/2022, with the home side securing a spot in the postseason as the fourth seed in the East.

They were followed immediately by the Canadians, who had three fewer wins to close out the regular season after 82 games.

Philadelphia 76ers – Statistics & current form

The Sixers have been champions three times, but their last triumph was a whopping 39 years ago. Now it should finally work out again from Philly’s point of view. The hopes in this context lie above all on the shoulders of Joel Embiid.

The centre from Cameroon has a good chance of securing the MVP title this season and was given an extremely powerful guard in James Harden a few weeks ago.

“The Beard” has quickly acclimatised within Head Coach Doc Rivers’ squad and has proved to be the reinforcement they had hoped for.

Toronto Raptors – Statistics & current form

The Raps put together an impressive season-ending spurt. Only two of the last ten games were lost from the perspective of the 2019 champions. This allowed them to book fifth place and thus the penultimate direct ticket to the playoffs.

Head coach Nick Nurse has recently been particularly pleased with the performances of Pascal Siakam. “Spicy P” delivered an average of 25.9 points in March and 28.4 points in April. Both balances are clearly above his seasonal value of 22.8 points.

Philadelphia 76ers – Toronto Raptors Tip

Even though the Sixers are the favourites in the series, it won’t be easy as the Raps don’t suit them. Only one of the four season duels could the home side win and the last defeat was less than a fortnight ago.

For the clash between the Philadelphia 76ers and Toronto Raptors in Game 1 on 17.04.2022, the tip aims for more than 23.5 points by Pascal Siakam on the side of the visitors.

The power forward is in a very good form and as part of the 2019 championship team, he is very familiar with the high pressure in the playoffs. Another factor in favour of the prediction is that Siakam already played strongly in the last direct duel with the Sixers.

He scored 37 points, the best output of all players on the court, and on top of that a triple-double in points, rebounds and assists. Siakam achieved the latter feat only one other time in 68 games this season!