The Eastern Conference semi-finals begin on Sunday with the Miami Heat visiting the New York Knicks. Both teams were the lower seeds in the previous round and will now battle for a surprising conference finals berth. Out west, we will get to see our first Game 7 of this season. The Sacramento Kings came out surprised victors in Game 6 on the road against the Golden State Warriors. Now they return home where they will hope to f inish the job.
Be sure to take a look at all of our'NBA predictions'for those games, but for now, let’s get into my NBA first basket scorer selections below.
Tonight, we are most likely to see Mitchell Robinson jump at tip for the New York Knicks. He is likely to be up against Miami Heat's Bam Adebayo. The pair have come across each other 3 times in the regular season, with the Knicks gaining the opening possession in 2 of those games. Robinson is the taller of the centers and should continue to maintain his advantage here. Julies Randle should take over from there.
On the season no other Knick has opened the scoring more in the game or for the team than Randle. In 81 starts, the Knicks forward has opened the scoring for his team on 29 occasions. 12 of these were the first points in the game overall. He could be up against Kevin Love tonight, who lacks the footspeed or length to really impact him. The Knicks have been top this post season in defensive rating so they could get multiple attempts at this if needed.