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Daily Fantasy Basketball: Games to target for March 18

DeMarcus Cousins and the Kings travel to Detroit to face the Pistons Friday night. Rocky Widner/NBAE/Getty Images

The highest scoring NBA games can be a great source of fantasy value for DFS. Here we’ll consider a few of the highest scoring contests, highlighting must own players, sneaky starts, and guys to fade. In addition to the total, we’ll consider the spread and how it might impact the game’s stars and/or open up some opportunity for bench players. To be successful in NBA DFS, you have to be attuned to talent, minutes, matchups and salaries. We’ll consider those attributes of the key players from these high scoring games.

Note: Lines can change at a moment's notice based on the actual bets placed on each game. Therefore, while any lines or odds mentioned in this column were accurate at the time of writing, they could have moved slightly since then. But because we're using this information only as an aid in our daily ranking process and nothing else, any such discrepancies shouldn't matter to the reader. Lines are provided by Westgate Las Vegas SuperBook as of Friday at 1 p.m.

Portland Trail Blazers at New Orleans Pelicans (-1.5)

Point total: 218.5

The coveted trio of a high point total, small point spread and impressive pace metrics is present in this matchup. A high implied point total and tight point spread often results in heavy minutes for the stars in such a scenario. The Pelicans are third in the NBA in pace over the past month, while the Blazers are 15th in the league over this stretch. This one should be fun on a great Friday slate rife with strong Vegas ingredients (every game is projected at 208 or higher, as of press time).

Players to target