Morning Coffee: SGA, Thunder emerge as massive NBA Title favourites

Come for the sun and stay for the Stanley Cup Finals!

Sunlit beaches, warm waves, palm trees.

And of course, Florida’s annual Stanley Cup chase.

Who would have thought that the Sunrise ice would be the hottest ticket in town once again this spring?

The Florida Panthers are headed to the Stanley Cup Finals for the third year in a row.

It’s the sixth straight year that a Florida-based team will compete on hockey’s biggest stage.

The Panthers will try to become just the 10th franchise in NHL history to repeat as Stanley Cup champions and the first since the Tampa Bay Lightning in 2020 and 2021.

There must be something in those coconut palms.

Meanwhile, there might not be as many sandy shores in Edmonton, Alberta, but they do have two of the best hockey players on the planet leading their charge.

The Edmonton Oilers are one win away from a Stanley Cup Finals rematch and a shot at redemption.

The Oilers have completely dominated the Dallas Stars in the Western Conference Finals except for one of the 12 periods to date.

However, the expectation is that the fourth win is almost always the most difficult in a best-of-seven, so maybe it shouldn’t be a surprise that Edmonton is a small dog for tonight’s Game 5 in Dallas.

On the topic of potential series-clinching wins, the Indiana Pacers can punch their ticket to the NBA Finals for the first time since 2000 with a win in Game 5 of the Eastern Conference Finals tonight on TSN.

The New York Knicks are a four-point favourite and -176 to keep their season alive with a win at MSG.

Canadian Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and the Oklahoma City Thunder clinched their spot in the NBA Finals last night with a rout of the Minnesota Timberwolves in Game 5 of the NBA’s Western Conference Finals.

While a potential Stanley Cup Finals rematch between the Oilers and Panthers would land somewhere around a pick’em at FanDuel, there won’t be nearly as much parity in the NBA Finals regardless of which team wins the East.

This is the Morning Coffee for Thursday May 29th, 2025.

SGA, Thunder Emerge As Massive NBA Title Favourites

The Thunder are headed back to the NBA Finals for the first time since 2012.

Unlike their first appearance on the game’s biggest stage, there won’t be a LeBron-led team from Florida standing in their way of winning an NBA championship.

Oklahoma City is expected to win the title.

In an NBA postseason fueled by upsets, any conclusion other than the Thunder winning the championship would stand as the biggest surprise of them all.

If you love your Morning Coffee and read Wednesday’s column, then you know all about the potential problem on the horizon for the NBA.

While the 2025 NBA Playoffs have been disrupted by volatility, the Thunder remain the exception to the rule.

Upsets that dominated the headlines in the first two rounds also increased the chances of a one-sided finish.

Eliminate the obstacles and the path to a predicted outcome becomes that much simpler.

Oklahoma City was +180 to win the NBA championship as the favourite at FanDuel when the postseason started.

The Thunder, Boston Celtics, and Cleveland Cavaliers were the top three choices as well as the only three teams with shorter than +1700 odds to win it all.

To reach the NBA Finals, the Thunder were expected to have to get past two of the following contenders: Los Angeles Lakers, Golden State Warriors, Denver Nuggets, or the Los Angeles Clippers.

If they survived that Western Conference gauntlet, the expectation was the Cavaliers or the defending champion Celtics would be waiting for them in the NBA Finals.

As it turns out, a seven-game series against Nikola Jokic and the Nuggets was the Thunder’s only challenge in the Western Conference while neither Boston nor Cleveland got past the second round in the Eastern Conference.

Per FanDuel’s futures markets, the Lakers and Warriors were expected to give Oklahoma City its toughest tests on that side of the bracket.

The Thunder didn’t have to play either of those teams.

The Celtics and Cavaliers were expected to give OKC its toughest possible NBA Finals matchups.

The Thunder won’t have to play either of those teams.

The Pacers are the first team in NBA history to advance to the conference finals as a four-seed or higher in back-to-back seasons.

When the Pacers and Knicks eliminated the Cavaliers and Celtics in the second round, it marked the first time in NBA history that there were two series upsets by teams priced at +400 or longer to advance.

Those second-round series upsets were thrilling to watch, but they also set the stage for a potentially historically lopsided conclusion to the NBA postseason.

What does a Thunder-Pacers series look like on paper?

Oklahoma City is -750 to win the NBA title at FanDuel.

Per the FanDuel traders, that number would jump to Thunder -770 for a potential NBA Finals versus Indiana.

Oklahoma City would be the biggest favourite to win an NBA Finals since the Golden State Warriors swept the Cleveland Cavaliers in 2018 at -1075.

For perspective, the Toronto Raptors were +230 to win the NBA championship when they faced the Warriors in the 2019 NBA Finals.

The Pacers would be +540 to upset the Thunder.

Meanwhile, Gilgeous-Alexander closed -1000 as the favourite to win the NBA regular season MVP at FanDuel.

SGA to win NBA Finals MVP is currently -600 at FanDuel.

Tyrese Haliburton is a distant second choice at +800.

A chaotic NBA Playoffs will wind down with Game 5 of the NBA’s Eastern Conference Finals on TSN tonight.

As unpredictable as the postseason has been to date, I’m certainly not counting on many more surprises.

The fact that we got the Thunder at +185 to win the NBA championship just three weeks ago seems like excellent value now with OKC at -750 to win the title.

Hopefully, chalk rules from here on out.

Any conclusion other than SGA winning NBA Finals MVP after leading OKC to its first championship would be the biggest stunner in a postseason full of surprises.

A FanDuel Best Bet For Thursday Night

We cashed a trio of FanDuel Best Bet winners last night with the Panthers to win Game 5, Florida to win the series, and Cats -1.5 in the series at +158.

With the Oilers to advance at -110 in-pocket, we’re also one win away from a clean 3-0 conference finals sweep.

It’s interesting that Edmonton is an underdog for Game 5.

The Oilers have dominated 11 of the first 12 periods in the series, winning three in a row to push the Stars to the brink of elimination.

As for a FanDuel Best Bet, I’ll lock in another builder Same Game Parlay with Connor McDavid 2+ shots on goal, and each of Mikael Granlund, Wyatt Johnston, and Miro Heiskanen to record 1+ shot on goal at +100 odds.

The SOG SGP’s have been a bit of a rollercoaster this postseason, but McDavid is a perfect 15-for-15 for 2+ shots on goal, Granlund 1+ is on a 12-for-12 run, Heiskanen 1+ is on a 6-for-6 run, and Johnston is coming off his first game without a shot on goal since April 23rd.

With the Stars facing elimination, I’ll count on Granlund, Heiskanen, and Johnston to each hit the net at least once in Game 5 tonight.

Meanwhile, McDavid is 15-for-15 and I don’t think Dallas will be able to slow him down tonight.

Hopefully, we can make it three FanDuel Best Bet winners in a row in this column.

Have a great day, everyone!