Tuesday's Best NBA Bets
Miami Heat at Boston Celtics (-6, 188)
The Heat avoided the embarrassment of getting swept out of the playoffs on their home court but that’s only because Dwyane Wade played one of the best games of his life.
It’s the same old story for Miami: D-Wade doing a whole lot and every other Heat player doing a whole lot of nothing.
Miami’s starting center, former All-Star Jermaine O’Neal, is averaging 3.5 points and 6.0 rebounds in the series' first four games. And Michael Beasley, who’s supposed to be the second scoring option, hasn’t netted more than 16 points through the first four games.
Boston wasn’t exactly an ATS killer at home this season (12-28-1) but you gotta like its chances of putting the Heat out of their misery on Tuesday.
Pick: Boston
San Antonio Spurs at Dallas Mavericks (-5, 193)
Looks like Mavs owner Mark Cuban wasn’t exaggerating when he said his team hated the Spurs. The disdain between these two sides was easily noticeable throughout Game 4 in San Antonio.
The Mavs’ cold spell in the third quarter sealed their fate. San Antonio stole the game despite getting just 31 points from its star trio of Tim Duncan, Tony Parker and Manu Ginobili.
"If Duncan goes 1-for-9 and Ginobili goes 4-for-16, you've got to win that game," Mavs forward Dirk Nowitzki told ESPN after the game.
It was San Antonio’s supporting cast that came to the rescue even though Gregg Popovich essentially used just a seven-man rotation.
“It's a team game,” guard George Hill, who led the Spurs in scoring with 29 points, told the San Antonio Express-News. “You can't just rely on the Big Three. It's going to take all 15 of us.”
The Mavs aren’t stupid. They know the math involved when one side goes down 3-1 in a best of seven series in the NBA. Just eight out of 189 teams have successfully come back to take the series.
But Dallas’ hate for San Antonio will fuel one more strong performance. The Mavs aren’t going to go quietly into the night, not against their in-state rivals.
Pick: Dallas
What Bettors Need To Know: Red Wings at Coyotes
Home away from home
Home ice hasn’t meant much in this first-round playoff series. The Coyotes, who finished fourth in the Western Conference, will host Game 7 Tuesday but may have wanted to see this showdown take place in enemy territory.
Phoenix and Detroit are 1-2 at home in this series with the Red Wings outscoring the Coyotes 13-8 inside Jobing.com Arena. The last time these teams played in Phoenix, Detroit rolled to a 4-1 victory, scoring three goals in the third period last Friday.
“It’s the fourth and fifth place teams so it’s (supposed to be tight),” Red Wings coach Mike Babcock told reporters. “They are a real good team, but we like to think we are a better team.
“The great thing about the seventh game is we will find the answer.”
I’ve got the power
The Coyotes forced Game 7 with a 5-2 win in Detroit Sunday night. Three of Phoenix’s goals came on the power play, improving the team to 21.4 percent efficiency (6-for-28) with the man advantage.
Taylor Pyatt, Radim Vrbata and former Red Wings player Mathieu Schneider all found the back of the net on the power play, with two of those goals coming in a busy second period in which Phoenix scored three goals while Detroit added one.
"It's one game," Schneider told the media about the team’s special teams. "I don't want to say we solved it, but it worked for us, and we want to keep doing the same thing. The fundamentals were there on the power play, when you look at the way we moved it.
"We had some real good puck movement, got some good shots. Robert Lang does a good job calming things down on the half-wall, just a big body, great reads, but everyone did a really good job."
The Coyotes also scored a shorthanded goal in the first period when Lauri Korpikoski gobbled up a turnover in the neutral zone and went in to beat Red Wings goaltender Jimmy Howard five hole to open the scoring just over four minutes into the game.
Seventh heaven?
When weighing both teams for Tuesday’s sudden-death showdown, hockey bettors have to give the edge to Detroit.
The playoff-savvy franchise has been in plenty of Game 7s, however, the last time they played in one in the first round of the postseason, they lost to the San Jose Sharks back in 2004. Red Wings fans have to go back to 1964 for the last time they won a first-round Game 7 on the road, defeating the Chicago Blackhawks.
According to the Detroit Free Press, Detroit is 12-8 all-time in Game 7 scenarios, including losing Game 7 of the Stanley Cup final to the Pittsburgh Penguins at home last season.
Doan and out
Despite being a late scratch from Sunday’s Game 6, Coyotes captain Shane Doan gave the team an emotional lift with his presence in the dressing room. Doan spoke to the team in between periods, helping guide them to a victory.
"Just a tremendous leader, one of the best leaders I've been fortunate enough to play with," Schneider told the Arizona Republic. "I played with a lot of great leaders; he's another great captain in this league."
Doan hasn’t played since Game 3 after suffering an upper-body injury. He had a goal and an assist in Game 2 of this series. During the regular season, Doan had 55 points and played all 82 games.
His status for Tuesday’s is currently listed as questionable.
Trends
- The over/under for this series is 3-1-2 with Game 6 playing over the 5-goal total.
- Red Wings are 16-5-3 in the last 24 meetings in Phoenix.
- Coyotes are 2-5 in their last 7 games following a win.
Game 7 in the Desert
By Judd Hall
It would have been a crime against hockey if there wasn’t a Game 7 in the first round of this season’s Stanley Cup Playoffs. Luckily for us all that the Red Wings and Coyotes agreed to grant us the ultimate must-win situation in sport at least one time before the conference semifinals.
If you were to ask Detroit, they would tell you that making the series go the distance wasn’t in its gameplan. The Red Wings went into last Sunday’s contest with a 3-2 lead in the series and posted as heavy $2.20 home favorites. It’s hard not to put the Wings in that role since they had outscored Phoenix 7-1 in the last two games. Plus, the ‘Yotes would be without their leader Shane Doan, who is still recuperating from an upper-body injury.
Something else that has been bothering Phoenix in this series has been poor special teams play. After scoring three power play goals in four chances in Game 1, the Coyotes were 0-for-18 Games 2 through 5. That all changed for the Desert Dogs on Sunday as they drilled Detroit 5-1 to tie the series at three wins apiece. They picked up the road win as $1.80 road pups on the strength of three power play goals on six opportunities. And they even got a short-handed goal from Lauri Korpikoski for good measure.
The Coyotes were able to keep close in terms of shots on goal (33-29). But they matched the battle-tested Wings on hits levied (32-30) and won the takeaway battle (8-6). Plus, one of those takeaways was turned into a visit to the Red Lamp District by Korpikoski in the first period.
Detroit’s Jimmy Howard was in a prime spot for a rookie netminder to gain a series-clinching win at home. Yet Howard yielded all five goals on just 29 shots on target. His opposite number for Phoenix, Ilya Bryzgalov, had stopped 31 of 32 shots before allow a garbage score in the final minutes of Game 6. Now Howard has to win his first playoff series in a hostile environment.
Despite the bad loss at home on Sunday afternoon, the Red Wings are still listed as $1.15 road favorites (risk $115 to win $100) with a total of five. While the total is right around where you’d expect it to be in a must-win battle, the line showing how much Gamblers can take the Coyotes to win this tilt as $1.05 home pups (risk $100 to win $105).
Phoenix shouldn’t have a care in the world in this game since they’re essentially playing with house money. This is a team that lost its owner over the summer and came pretty close to moving to Hamilton, Ontario had it not been for a judge’s ruling. If that weren’t enough, they didn’t get Dave Tippett to run the Coyotes until a week before the regular season began.
Now this is the first time the Coyotes have been in the playoffs in six seasons. Yet this franchise hasn’t won a postseason series since moving from Winnipeg for the 1996-97 campaign. That includes two seven-game defeats. You have to go back to the 1987 Stanley Cup Playoffs to find the club’s last series win: a three-games-to-one decision over the Flames in the Smythe Division Semifinal.
For the Red Wings, this isn’t unfamiliar territory. This is the franchise’s 19th consecutive season of qualifying for the postseason. Detroit has been involved in six Game 7s since the 1991 Playoffs. In those six contests, they’ve compiled a 3-3 mark. They played in two Game 7s in last year’s postseason: Won against the Ducks in the West Semifinal and then lost on home ice to the Pens for the Stanly Cup.
What has been a little strange for Detroit to deal with in this game is they won’t have home ice advantage since they are the fifth seed in the Western Conference. The Wings have been in six Game 7s as a visiting club since 1991. They’ve won just two of those tilts and lost their last three in this spot.
Since the National Hockey League returned from the 2005 lockout, road in teams in Game 7 have gone 5-6. That isn’t a terrible record at all, but bettors and puck heads know that home-ice rarely means anything in the playoffs. And last year proved that anything can happen in these contests as three of the four visitors won that final showdown of their series. That includes the Penguins, who beat Washington in the East Semifinal and Detroit in last year’s championship round.
Phoenix is 2-1 in its last three games as a home pup after winning as a road underdog in its last game. The ‘under’ is 2-1 in those contests as well. The Wings are 6-2 in their previous eight games as road faves after losing as home favorites. The ‘under’ is 4-2-2 in those tilts.
vegasinsider.com
Detroit Red Wings vs. Phoenix Coyotes
The Detroit Red Wings and the Phoenix Coyotes will both be trying to pick up a win on Tuesday when they battle at Jobing.com Arena.
The Coyotes defeated Detroit 5-2 as a +180 underdog in Game 6 of their first-round playoff series on Sunday. The seven goals scored went OVER the posted over/under total (5).
Ilya Bryzgalov made 31 saves for Phoenix and Taylor Pyatt had a goal and an assist in the win.
Brad Stuart and Darren Helm scored for Detroit and Jimmy Howard made 24 saves.
Team records:
Detroit: 44-24-14
Phoenix: 50-25-7
Detroit most recently:
When playing on Tuesday are 5-5
Before playing Edmonton are 8-2
After playing Phoenix are 4-6
After a loss are 7-3
Phoenix most recently:
When playing on Tuesday are 3-7
Before playing Chicago are 5-5
After playing Detroit are 5-5
After a win are 5-5
A few trends to consider:
Detroit is 4-1 SU in its last 5 games on the road
Detroit is 10-3 SU in its last 13 games when playing on the road against Phoenix
Detroit is 16-6 SU in its last 22 games
Detroit is 16-6 SU in its last 22 games when playing Phoenix
Phoenix is 8-2 SU in its last 10 games at home
Phoenix is 16-8 SU in its last 24 games
Phoenix is 6-16 SU in its last 22 games when playing Detroit
Phoenix is 4-15-3 SU in its last 22 games ,when playing at home against Detroit
DETROIT (47-27-0-14, 108 pts.) at PHOENIX (53-28-0-7, 113 pts.)
There are no Top Trends with records of significance that apply to this game.
Head-to-Head Series History
DETROIT is 12-6 (+1.4 Units) against the spread versus PHOENIX over the last 3 seasons
DETROIT is 12-6-0 straight up against PHOENIX over the last 3 seasons
9 of 14 games in this series have gone OVER THE TOTAL over the last 3 seasons . (Over=+3.4 Units)
DETROIT vs. PHOENIX
Detroit is 16-6 SU in its last 22 games
Detroit is 4-1 SU in its last 5 games on the road
Phoenix is 16-8 SU in its last 24 games
Phoenix is 8-2 SU in its last 10 games at home
Western Conference Playoffs
First Round, Game Seven (Series Tied, 3-3)
DETROIT at PHOENIX
DETROIT: 7-13 SU revenging a home loss
PHOENIX: 11-2 SU off a win by 3+ goals