SportsLine’s model simulated New York vs. Boston 10,000 times and revealed its NBA picks for Wednesday’s Game 5 Eastern Conference semifinal matchup, as the Celtics will be without leading scorer Jayson Tatum .The Boston Celtics will look to stay alive in their best-of-seven series when they battle the New York Knicks in Game 5 of their Eastern Conference semifinal matchup on Wednesday. New York took a commanding 3-1 series lead with a 121-113 win on Monday as Jalen Brunson and Karl-Anthony Towns combined for 62 points. The Knicks (51-31), who are looking to advance to the conference finals for the first time since 1999-00, are looking to defeat Boston for the first time in the postseason since the 2013 first round. The Celtics (61-21), the defending NBA champions, are looking to reach the conference finals for the fourth straight season. Boston will be without Jayson Tatum, who suffered an Achilles injury late in Game 4.The SportsLine Projection Model simulates every NBA game 10,000 times and has returned well over $10,000 in betting profit for $100 players on its top-rated NBA picks over the past six-plus seasons. The model enters the second week of the conference semifinals of the 2025 NBA playoffs on a sizzling 159-117 roll on all top-rated NBA picks, returning nearly $4,000. It is also 23-11 (68%) on top-rated NBA against-the-spread picks this season. Anyone following at sportsbooks and on betting apps could have seen huge returns.Boston trailed by nine points in the first half but closed the third quarter on a 23-9 run and took a 91-76 lead to the fourth. Brunson spent the final 2:45 of the third on the bench after picking up his fifth foul.
The Celtics kept it going in the final period, pushing their lead as high as 28 points.The game was highly physical throughout and included a brief face-to-face skirmish between Hart and Brown.That energy carried over offensively. The Celtics came out hot, getting five 3s from White and 12 total in the opening 24 minutes.When the half ended, the score was knotted 59-59.The Celtics kept it going in the final period, pushing their lead as high as 28 points.
