Free Picks: Premium Service Plays for Tuesday, November 23,2010

Ben Burns

10* Cavaliers / Pacers Over

Due in large part to Indiana's recent results, this O/U line has come down from its opener. I believe that's providing us with plenty of value. These teams met at Cleveland a couple of weeks ago. The Pacers managed 99 points but the Cavaliers didn't do their part, scoring only 85. That was a rather pathetic second half performance for the Cavs, given that the score was 54-54 at halftime. While the Pacers have admittedly been playing some pretty stingy defense of late, I expect better production from Cleveland. In three games since facing the Pacers, they've averaged 98 points. They've also allowed an average of 106.3 points in those games. In fact, for the season, Cleveland road games have been much higher-scoring than Cleveland home games. Not only do the Cavs allow more points on the road, they've also scored more. Overall, their road games are averaging 205.2 points. Not surprisingly, four of their six road games have finished above the total. After giving up a lot of points, some teams tend to bounce back with a much better defensive effort. That hasn't been the case for the Cavs though as we find the OVER at 20-10 the last 30 times that they allowed 105 or more points in their previous game. The Pacers are off an impressive win at Miami last night. While they've played in back to back spots many times, typically the second of those two games occurs on the road, as was the case when these teams met earlier. However, occasionally, the second of the back to back games occurs here at home. My assistant tells me that this is just the fourth time that the Pacers have played at home, after playing the previous day, in the 2010 calendar year. While the OVER was only 2-2, those games had scores of 185, 235, 222 and 206. That's an average of 212. I look for this one to also finish in the 200s.

7* Edmonton Oilers +1.5

With the Coyotes listed as heavy favorites on the moneyline, that's given us the opportunity to play Edmonton at a reasonable price at +1.5 goals. Given the situation, I feel that's providing excellent value. True, the Coyotes are on a roll. However, this is their first game back home off a successful road trip and that's often a difficult spot. Also, a look at their recent games shows that they've almost all been close. While the Coyotes have won seven of their last 11 games, none of those seven victories came by more than two goals and five of them came by only a single goal. That means, that if the Coyotes had been laying -1.5 for all those games, they'd be just 2-9. The Oilers snapped an extended losing streak in their last game. Often, when a team "gets the monkey off their back," by snapping a long losing streak, they follow it up with another strong effort. I expect that to be the case here. The Oilers are playing with 'revenge,' as the Coyotes just beat them in Edmonton, a few nights ago. Like most recent Phoenix games, that one was extremely close. In fact Edmonton was leading in the third period until the Coyotes scored with 35 seconds left to tie the game. Overtime settled nothing and Coyotes ended up winning in a shootout. That was certainly a painful loss and the Oilers should be hungry for some immediate payback. Note that their last game in Phoenix was also decided by a single goal, a 3-2 win for the Coyotes last April. After beating the Oilers at Edmonton, Phoenix coach Dave Tippet acknowledged his team was fortunate: "We were on our heels and made some mental mistakes. We were fortunate to get over those. Usually when you make those you don't win. We'll take the points." While the Oilers are only 3-10 SU their last 13 games, if getting +1.5 goals in all those games, they would have been a much better 8-5. Playing with immediate 'revenge,' I expect them to give the Coyotes all they can handle for the second time in less than a week.