The East's No. 3 seed Philadelphia 76ers will open up the first round of the 2023 NBA playoffs against the No. 6 seed Brooklyn Nets. Game 1 will tip-off on Sunday at 3:00 a.m. AEST at the Wells Fargo Center. The Sixers dominated the Nets during the regular season, sweeping the four-game season series, which is impressive considering Philadelphia has played multiple iterations of Brooklyn this season.
This is also the second time in five years that these two teams will be playing each other in the NBA playoffs. In their last meeting in the postseason, Philadelphia took down the Nets in five games. That Sixers' team had Ben Simmons, Joel Embiid, Tobias Harris, and Jimmy Butler. Meanwhile, Spencer Dinwiddie was leading the way for the Nets. Now, Simmons is on the Nets, and Dinwiddie is back in Brooklyn after being traded in February from the Mavericks for Kyrie Irving.
This year's playoff series should be a fun matchup as the Sixers have their eyes set on a bigger prize and will look for MVP front-runner Joel Embiid to lead the way. However, the Nets will try to put a wrench in the Sixers' plans, as budding star wing Mikal Bridges, who has taken his game to new heights this season, will play a big factor in what happens through this first-round series.
Below, we'll down the series odds for this matchup while giving our prediction on how many games Sixers-Nets will go and series prop that bettors should consider checking out.
Sixers vs. Nets series odds, picks, predictions
| Team | Odds |
| Nets | $7.00 |
| Sixers | $1.10 |
It's not a surprise to see the Sixers as overwhelming favorites to win their first-round series against the Nets. The Sixers have dominated the Nets this season, defeating Brooklyn by an average of 11.3 points per game. Philadelphia has advanced past the first round in the first two years of the Doc Rivers era and four out of the past five seasons. The Sixers only first-round loss happened in the bubble in 2020 when the Celtics swept them in four games.
Embiid and Co. will try to set the tone at home, where they went 29-12 during the regular season. As for the Nets, they will try to steal home-court advantage with Bridges leading the way. Brooklyn went 6-7 on the road during the second half of the regular season, which isn't bad for a team that had a ton of turnover. For the Nets to keep this series close, they will need at least a couple of 35-point efforts from Bridges, who is averaging 26.1 points per game since joining Brooklyn.
Betting advice: We wouldn't advise bettors to take the Sixers at $1.10, but they are the better team and should win this series. Brooklyn has Nic Claxton, who could Embiid some issues defensively, but the MVP candidate should dominate offensively. The Sixers also have James Harden and Tyrese Maxey, who are better offensively than Dinwiddie and Cam Johnson. Philly also has a slight bench advantage, but don't sleep on the Nets' bench, as they have three solid shooters/scorers in Seth Curry, Joe Harris, and Cam Thomas.
NBA Playoffs 2023 odds: Correct series result for Sixers-Nets
| Series result | Odds |
| Brooklyn Nets (4-0) | $81 |
| Brooklyn Nets (4-1) | $41 |
| Brooklyn Nets (4-2) | $19 |
| Brooklyn Nets (4-3) | $6.50 |
| Philadelphia 76ers (4-0) | $3.25 |
| Philadelphia 76ers (4-1) | $3.00 |
| Philadelphia 76ers (4-2) | $5.00 |
| Philadelphia 76ers (4-3) | $6.50 |
Since we like the Sixers to win the series, the best bet would be to take them to win in five or six games. Even though Philadelphia swept Brooklyn 4-0 this season and is 1-0 against the Bridges, Dinwiddie, and Cam Johnson Nets, it's hard to see the Sixers sweeping them in the playoffs as the Nets are still a solid basketball team on both ends of the floor.
In Rivers' first two postseason appearances with the Sixers, Philadelphia defeated Toronto in six games in the first round and defeated the Wizards in five games in the first round. Last year, the Sixers had the opportunity to close out their opening-round matchup against the Raptors quickly after taking a commanding 3-0 series lead, but they wound up needing six games.
Betting advice: If you like the Sixers to advance, the best way to get a return on investment is taking them to win the series 4-1 or 4-2, which ties directly into our final series prop.
NBA Playoffs 2023 odds: Game/Series double prop for Sixers-Nets
| Game/Series Double | Odds |
| Brooklyn Nets to win Game 1 and Nets to win the series | $13 |
| Brooklyn Nets to win Game 1 and Sixers to win series | $5.00 |
| Philadelphia 76ers to win Game 1 and Nets to win the series | $13 |
| Philadelphia 76ers to win Game 1 and Sixers to win the series | $1.33 |
If you like the Sixers to win Game 1 on Sunday, you are better off just taking them on the spread, and if you like them to win the series, bettors should bet on one or two of the correct series results. At $1.33 for the Sixers to win Game 1 and the series, bettors are not getting any value back. However, there's a chance Brooklyn wins Game 1, and Philadelphia wins the series, which happened in 2019 between these two teams.
The Sixers have won three out of their past five Game 1s in the first round. The only two times that the Sixers lost Game 1 was against the Nets (2018-19) and Celtics (2019-20). There's also a small chance that the Nets take Game 1 and the series, which is priced at 14/1 odds. We saw Brooklyn do this in the 2020-21 season, where they defeated the Celtics in five games and won Game 1. However, that Brooklyn team had Kevin Durant, James Harden, and Kyrie Irving, so we're not expecting a repeat.
Betting advice: There's no value in betting the -$1.33 odds if you like the Sixers to dominate in both situations, but if you believe that the Nets steal home-court advantage and Sixers will still win the series outright, then $5.00 is a solid bet.
