NBA Basketball
2026-11-06 - Philadelphia 76ers at Cleveland Cavaliers
A Sports Betting Pick by FirstDown
United States : NBA Cup Group Stage
Friday 6th November 2026 - Scheduled 7:30pm EST
12:30am (British Time)
Preview
The win over the New York Knicks in the NBA Cup has put the Philadelphia 76ers (8-1) into a position of favourites to top this Group ahead of the second round robin of games. It is the second win over the defending Champions in what has been a very strong start to the season for a team who have signed the likes of Jaylen Brown and LeBron James to close the gap on the Champions.
The one and only defeat of the season has already been avenged when the 76ers beat the Detroit Pistons last time out and that has allowed Philadelphia to move to the top of the very early Eastern Conference standings. There is a long road between now and the NBA Finals in June, but the 76ers will want to make an early impact on the season and that comes through the NBA Cup.
LeBron James will be facing the Cleveland Cavaliers (4-4) on the road having decided against returning to his home team for the second time in his career.
An injury hit roster will be awaiting LeBron and it is something of a surprise that there are tickets available when the last decade plus has been a sellout when James returns to Cleveland. That has perhaps underlined the difficult and inconsistent start made by the Cavaliers, who will be missing some key parts of the rotation and who need more from Donovan Mitchell and James Harden if they are going to put some solid form together.
This is the opener of the NBA Cup for the Cavaliers and they are at home, but they have suffered three losses in the last four games, which will have dented some confidence. The unbeaten start to the season at home was ended by the Oklahoma City Thunder in that time and Cleveland are going to find it tough to find some consistency on the Offensive side of the court.
One of the problems is losing Jarrett Allen to an injury, which will impact the Offensive Rebounding numbers. He may not be risked having hurt his knee earlier in the week and this Cleveland team are very reliant on the three point shooting to be working in their bid to win games.
The 76ers are going to be pretty confident they can at least challenge the shooters when they spot up and they do look to match up pretty well with Cleveland on the other side of the court.
Balance has been the stand out approach to the Offensive plan and that has allowed the 76ers to begin this season in such a strong fashion. The belief was that it would take a bit of time for this roster to come together as a number of star names play together for the first time, but things have settled quickly on both ends of the court and that makes Philadelphia a difficult team to knock off without a full complement of players.
Last month, the 76ers were able to beat Cleveland at home and they can back that up to move to 2-0 in this NBA Group.
Prediction
Lay the points with the road favourite in the second round robin of NBA Cup Group games.
The Pick :
Cleveland Cavaliers 104-110 Philadelphia 76ers
BEST BETTING TIP :
I'll back Philadelphia 76ers - 2.5 Points at -108 with BetOnlineCanadian Customers Can Now Play with Bet365)
