After eking out a narrow win in Game 2, the Knicks will follow the two-game road sweep of the Spurs and head back to New York, where they'll look to take a 3-0 lead in the series.
Tickets for Game 3 at Madison Square Garden have elevated into seven figures, and you can bet it'll be a star-studded Celebrity Row that will make a Laker game look pale by comparison. The whole city is humming with Knicks fever, and home court advantage will definitely be in play in this environment. I'll be identifying my favorite builds for FanDuel's single-game contests, and for the uninitiated, I've provided a brief summary of how it works.
For FanDuel single-game contests, participants are given six positions to fill. While five are normal (UTIL) spots, the remaining slot allows for a 1.5x multiplier (MVP) to be given to a selected player. That's a significant bonus, but there's a catch. The player's base salary is also multiplied by 1.5x when used in the multiplier spot. The biggest difference between DraftKings and FanDuel involves roster limits. On DraftKings, you can't pick more than four players from one team. That limit doesn't apply to FanDuel, as they only require you to take from both clubs with a maximum of five.
The most common mistake made by DFS participants is assuming that finding the game's top scorer and placing them in the multiplier is the key to winning. While that approach can occasionally pay off, it's not often the case. The best producer will usually carry a high salary on the 1.5x multiplier to restrict your ability to maximize the UTIL spots. If a player's base value is $10,000, that increases to $15,000 under the multiplier to eat up a sizable chunk of available funds.
Before we move forward, let's look at Friday's results and analyze a winning FanDuel lineup for Game 2.
MVP Mikal Bridges 57.3
UTIL Victor Wembanyama 56.8
UTIL Karl-Anthony Towns 46.6
UTIL De'Aaron Fox 33.1
UTIL OG Anunoby 38.3
UTIL Devin Vassell 35.3
Noticeably missing from this winning build is Jalen Brunson, who posted a 20/5/6 line along with a game-high five steals. Brunson compiled 46 FDFP in the contest, but he had a slightly higher buy-in in the multiplier. The Brunson vs. Towns conundrum is something we're forced to deal with in this series, but it's going to be more important to identify the supporting cast surrounding the choice.
Use our FanDuel NBA Lineup Optimizer to discover more expert recommendations, customize the player pool, set exposure percentage and mass-enter DFS lineups.
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NO SIGNIFICANT INJURIES
MVP (1.5x) Candidates
Jalen Brunson, NYK (MVP $18,300, UTIL $12,200)
Karl-Anthony Towns, NYK (MVP $18,000, UTIL $12,000)
Mikal Bridges, NYK (MVP $8,400, UTIL $5,600)
I don't think any of these three are big surprises. We have close salaries between Towns and Brunson once again, and while I don't think resorting to either-or is necessary, those who want a more balanced approach may have to make a choice. I chose correctly with Bridges in Game 2, and I think we'll be able to reap similar value from him at home. He also gives us a lot of breathing room and increases our ability to reach higher for at least one elite in the Utility sector, with one obvious piece coming to the forefront.
Utility Candidates
Victor Wembanyama, SAS ($16,800)
De'Aaron Fox, SAS ($7,600)
OG Anunoby, NYK ($7,200)
Devin Vassell, SAS ($5,800)
Julian Champagnie, SAS ($4,800)
Dylan Harper, SAS ($4,800)
While I think Wemby is altogether too expensive as an MVP candidate, I won't hesitate to make him the first premier elite off the board. We run into big trouble with the salary cap if we go with Towns/Wemby/Brunson/Bridges ($3,700/slot remaining). Ideally, I'd like to limit my bargain hunting to Harper, Champagnie and above. A Bridges/Wemby/Towns/Brunson gives us much more relief with a $5,333 per-player average. With Champagnie and Harper priced similarly, we can plug one of them in and finish with a Bridges/Wembanyama/Brunson/Towns/Champagnie/Vassell build. The only way to get away from this San Antonio lean is to eliminate an elite. Taking Wemby off leaves a lot on the table, so omitting him doesn't make much sense unless you're bullish on Stephon Castle, which lacks the consistency needed at his price point. I balk at taking Brunson or Towns off the board. Enter Landry Shamet ($1,800), who can fill out the build effectively with $1,600 left over. I prefer to leave less on the table, but taking Shamet maximizes my desired elites without sacrificing too much. The final preferred build:
Bridges/Wemby/Brunson/Towns/Anunoby/Shamet
